April 3, 2011
Complete Results
Site: University Park, Pa.
Score: No. 18 Northwestern 7, Penn State 0
Records: NU (11-5, 4-0 Big Ten) Penn State (5-11, 0-4)
Next NU Event: Thursday, April 7 vs. Notre Dame Evanston 3 p.m. CT
EVANSTON, Ill. -- No. 18 Northwestern preceded an upcoming six-match homestand with a convincing 7-0 road victory over Penn State on Sunday, winning for the sixth consecutive outing and improving to 4-0 in the Big Ten this season.
The victory was the 298th in the 13-year Northwestern career for head coach Claire Pollard.
"We have a very tough stretch of matches coming up so it was important for us to come out and play well this weekend, which I thought we did," Pollard said after the match. "We hit our first peak of the season back around the first week of March and now it's time to start working toward peaking again in May."
Penn State got off to an auspicious start in Sunday's dual by claiming an 8-3 win at No. 3 doubles in the first match off the courts. But it was all Northwestern from that point forward, beginning with an 8-4 doubles win at No. 1 by senior Maria Mosolova and freshman Belinda Niu against Marie Bedard and Fernanda Perrotta, the ninth victory in the last 10 outings for Mosolova and Niu.
Shortly after, seventh-ranked Linda Abu Mushrefova and Nida Hamilton completed an 8-4 win of their own, downing Petra Januskova and Amy Simidian to clinch a 1-0 Wildcats lead entering singles.
Northwestern came into the match with a 9-2 record on the season in matches where it won the doubles point, and the 'Cats quickly went to work improving that record to 10-2. Junior Stacey Lee improved to 8-5 in dual action this season with her 6-3, 6-0 downing of Bedard at the No. 5 singles line.
That win was quickly followed by Mosolova's easy 6-2, 6-1 victory over Januskova at the top spot, giving Mosolova a chance to bring her perfect 12-0 dual record into a possible showdown with Notre Dame's third-ranked Kristy Frilling on Thursday.
Sophomore Kate Turvy was responsible for the clinching fourth point, cruising past Carmen Sandor, 6-2, 6-1, to move to 10-3 on the dual season, while classmate Linda Abu Mushrefova finished off a 6-3, 7-5 win at No. 6 over Perrotta for NU's fifth point.
Niu and Wowchuk had their singles matches delayed at the outset due to the four-court setup inside Penn State's Sarni Tennis Center. Wowchuk, playing her first singles match since returning from an injury sustained on Feb. 19, led PSU's Denisa Zobeidah, 4-3, in the first when Zobeidah was forced to retire with an injury of her own. The 74th-ranked Niu later closed Northwestern's day with a 6-3, 6-2 win over Amy Simidian at No. 2 for her sixth straight win.
Northwestern is back in action Thursday when the Wildcats welcome regional foe 19th-ranked Notre Dame to the Combe Tennis Center in Evanston at 3 p.m.
No. 11 Northwestern 7, Penn State 0
Singles:
1: #16 Maria Mosolova (NU) def. Petra Januskova (PSU), 6-2, 6-1
2: #74 Belinda Niu (NU) def. Amy Simidian (PSU), 6-3, 6-2
3: #92 Kate Turvy (NU) def. Carmen Sandor (PSU), 6-2, 6-1
4: #50 Brittany Wowchuk (NU) def. Denisa Zobeidah (PSU), 4-3, ret.
5: Stacey Lee (NU) def. Maria Bedard (PSU), 6-3, 6-0
6: Linda Abu Mushrefova (NU) def. Fernanda Perrotta (PSU), 6-3, 7-5
Doubles:
1: #7 Abu Mushrefova/Hamilton (NU) def. Januskova/Simidian (PSU), 8-4
2: Mosolova/Niu (NU) def. Bedard/Perrotta (PSU), 8-4
3: Zobeidah/Sandor (PSU) def. Chernyakova/Wowchuk (NU), 8-3
Order of Finish:
Singles: (5, 1, 3*, 6, 5, 2)
Doubles: (3, 2, 1*)
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