On Sunday at Noon, the #13 Oklahoma Sooners faced the #4 Michigan Wolverines in Headington Family Tennis Center and Headington we full of fans from both Michigan and Oklahoma. The Michigan fans traveled very well to support their team. Just like the match on Friday against #14 Ohio State, the match went right down to the final points of the match. In the end, Michigan prevailed with 4 points to 3 points to defeat the Sooners. Here is the staff writers article about the match.
https://soonersports.com/news/2024/1/21 ... 4-michigan
In the Doubles, the #2 team for the Sooners won their second match of the weekend. Chloe Noel and Julia Garcia Ruiz played well and won over the Michigan team 6-2. IMO, watching both matches this weekend, Noel and Garcia Ruiz make up a very good team with their two styles of play. I think they will be very successful this season. The Sooner #3 team, Roisin Gilheany and Romana Cisovska dropped their match on Sunday to Michigan by the score of 2-6. Gilheany and Cisovska were defeated twice in double this weekend. Both Noel and Gilheany are freshman for the Sooners.
The Sooner #1 team of Alina Shcherbinina and Dana (pronounced Donna) Guzman were 'on serve' in the match against Ohio State on Friday when the Double point was won. On Sunday the double point came down to their match with Michigan. the match was very good match to watch as a fan with many long rallies and quick play at the net at times. The match boiled down to a 5-5 tie. Michigan won their sixth game on their serve and then broke the Sooners serve to win the match 7-5. With just a couple points changing the Sooners might have won the Doubles point. Shcherbinina/Guzman were very successful last fall in Doubles in ITA play. They will be a very good team this spring. I think the Sooners will win the Double point most of the time.
With Michigan up 1-0, the Singles matches started with a little wrinkle. OU flipped the #3 and #4 spots as Noel and Guzman swapped positions with Guzman moving up to the #3 spot.
Michigan earned their 2nd point of the match as their #1 player, Miller (who also played #1 singles) defeated Shcherbinina 6-1, 6-1. Shcherbinina had a tough weekend in singles as she dropped both of her matches. The Sooners won their first point of the match with Ava Catanzarite (a lefty) playing well and winning two straight sets over her Michigan opponent 6-2, 6-2 in the #6 match. Catanzarite split her two matches this weekend as she lost in three sets (5-7 in the third) on Friday night to Ohio State. Dana Guzman, playing up in the #3 spot, played well and defeated her Michigan opponent 6-3, 6-1 for her second straight set win this weekend. Guzman is very steady and just never gives up an easy point. She is very fun to watch play. Guzman's win evened the score at 2-2.
In the #2 match, Florencia Urrutia for the Sooners dropped the 1st set 2-6 to Michigan. But Urrutia battled back to win the 2nd set 6-3 to even her match. In the 3rd set the Michigan player, Fliegner, played very well I thought and won the 3rd set 6-1 for Michigan's 3rd point of the match. Over on the#5 court, Garcia Ruiz for the Sooners had dropped the first set 4-6 but she rebounded to win the 2nd set 6-4. In the third set, the play was back and fourth with breaks but Garcia Ruiz finished strong to win the 3rd 6-3. With the Garcia Ruiz win the match was now tied at 3-3. Garcia won both of her singles matches this weekend to be the only Sooner that was undefeated this weekend in both Singles and Doubles.
The match was left up to Chloe Noel on Court #4. That is a bit unfair actually. It is just that her match was still going on which happens to someone, it was Urrutia on Friday that was the last Sooner playing. I actually moved to the even court side of Headington to watch Noel play after the first set. She plays a serve, chip and go to the net game most of the time. If she get to the net, she can win lots of points. Yesterday, Noel won the first set 6-3. The second set was back and forth against Mesochoritou of Michigan who was a baseline player. If I remember correctly, Mesochoritou broke Noel at 6-5 to force the tie-breaker in the second set. Michigan won the tie breake 8-6 to force a 3rd set of play. Again the play was back and fourth between Noel and Mesochoritou. This time, Noel played well late to force another tie-breaker for the match and for the team result. that is a large dose of pressure for a freshman. Michigan's Mesochoritou is a senior. The tie-breaker was tied at 4-4 before Mesochoritou won three straight points to win the match and a Michigan win.
The match was very close as things hinged on a few points in both the Doubles and the Singles. The Sooners are rebuilding in a sense as only Guzman and Garcia Ruiz played regularly for the Sooner last spring. Cisovska did play at times last spring. Another returning player for OU, Emma Straker has only played one singles match this spring after playing a lot with winning records in doubles and singles in 2023. I do not think the Sooners lineup is set as of yet. There is a great deal of tennis to be played this spring.
The #13 Sooner Women played well this weekend against the #14 and #4 team in the country. The Sooners might drop a step in the rankings, but both matches were within a handful of points of being own by the Sooners. It took all 9 matches for both Ohio State and Michigan to earn their wins. Last spring, the Sooners traveled to both Michigan and Ohio State when they were ranked #20 and #17 and the Sooners were ranked #4 in the country. OU dropped both matches on the road by the score of 2-5. In 2023, the Sooners were very good as they won the Big 12 regular season crown.
Boomer Sooner!