DeKALB – A rally during the closing matches wasn’t enough to complete a comeback as NIU women’s tennis lost 4-3 to Western Michigan University at Nelson Tennis Center in the Chick Evans Field House. NIU ended its season on three consecutive losses, all against MAC opponents.

With the loss, NIU finishes the season 12-16 overall, and 2-8 in the MAC. WMU finishes 14-8 overall, and 5-5 in the MAC

DOUBLES

An underwhelming performance during the opening matches had NIU playing from behind for the majority of the meet. WMU stole the doubles point after the Huskies dropped matches at the No. 1 and No. 3 spots. In losing the doubles point, NIU failed to claim the doubles point for the fifth consecutive match. 

The Broncos duo of freshman Audrey Smitek and junior Karin Hamilton took freshmen Jenna Horne and Isabella Righi to nine sets. An even matchup tied 3-3 through the first six sets was capped off with a dominant 3-0 run by WMU’s duo. The Broncos clinched the doubles point with a victory in the match. 

Junior Diana Lukyanova and sophomore Reagan Welch’s battle against graduate student Kaitlyn Rogosch and freshman Ariane Souligny ended prematurely due to WMU taking matches at the No. 2 and No. 3 singles spots. NIU held a commanding 5-3 lead through the first eight sets when the official ended the match. 

Doubles have been the Achilles’ heel for NIU all season, and head coach Eric Burns talked about how damaging losing the doubles point is to the team’s chances. 

“When you’re playing these teams and it’s also tied, it really hurts to lose that doubles play,” Burns said. “It puts you in really bad shape having to win four out of six singles. It doesn’t give you much margin for error.” 

SINGLES

WMU was in command during singles play, winning two consecutive matches right out of the gate. WMU took matchups at the No. 2 and the No. 3 spots after clinching a win through the first four matches. 

NIU captured a win at singles for the first time in three weeks with a two-set showdown between NIU freshman Nataly Ninova and WMU junior Valeriya Monko at the No. 3 spot. Ninova took the first set in a tight 7-6 tiebreaking victory before defeating Monko 6-2 in the second. Ninova’s victory narrowed the deficit to 3-1 for WMU. 

In the final match of the season, WMU’s Souligny took just 15 games to defeat Righi. A 6-0 shutout in the first set was followed by a 6-3 victory to close. WMU retired at the No. 2 and No. 6 spots following this match. 

After getting eliminated from the MAC tournament last week, NIU’s season has come to an end. Even though the Huskies were inconsistent through most of the season, Burns was impressed with some individual performances from his group. 

“Well, they probably had a lot of good individual performances,” Burns said. “We had some people play really solid tennis at times. It just seemed like we couldn’t have everyone playing at once.” 

NIU has five months to make the necessary adjustments to turn this team around next season. With a majority of NIU’s roster set to return, Burns is optimistic that next season will look a whole lot different. 

“We should do some things a little differently going into next year, and we have some ideas,” Burns said. “We got the whole team returning. So, I mean, we’ve got a good chance to beat some of these older teams in the league. If everyone progresses and makes changes to their games and do the things they need to improve and get better, we can be in a good position next year.”