The UCLA women’s tennis team finally opens up Pac-10 play
this weekend after a two-week hiatus from dual match play. Though
the No. 16 Bruins have already taken on four fellow Pac-10 schools,
their 3-1 record against them thus far will not count toward the
final conference standings. When the Bruins take on Washington
State and Washington this weekend they look to continue where they
left off when they traveled to Arizona to shut out both the
Wildcats and the Arizona State Sun Devils. “They’re big
matches for us,” junior Alex McGoodwin said. “We just
need to be ready to go and do what we did in Arizona: get two solid
7-0 victories and get off the courts.” The Bruins were
scheduled to take on the Cal Poly Mustangs last Friday in a match
that would serve as a breather between two sets of dual matches,
but the match was postponed due to the chance of rain. The break in
play has left UCLA eager to get back on the courts to take part in
a pair of high-intensity dual matches. “I think we’re
all anxious,” sophomore Tracy Lin said. “We want to do
this and get these wins from the two Washington schools.” The
goal seems realistic considering the Huskies (1-7) and Cougars
(5-5) don’t boast the most talented lineups in the Pac-10,
but UCLA knows better than to let their guard down. “I know
Washington State hasn’t been really tough in the past and I
know that Washington has lost some of its better players,”
McGoodwin said. “But we have to be ready to play because
anything can happen.” If the Bruins can live up to the
expectations they set for themselves and capture two early 7-0
conference victories, they would put themselves in an ideal
position before heading into their matchup at USC next weekend to
face the No. 4 Trojans. The team knows better than to look that far
ahead though, focusing solely on this weekend before beginning to
think about their next match. “I’m not thinking about
it yet, but I’m taking one match at a time instead,”
freshman Anna-Viktoria Lind said of the match against USC, which
will be the first she will take part in.
MOVING UP THE RANKS: When the new national rankings were
released Monday, the Bruins found themselves four spots lower than
they were just a week ago, when they checked in at No. 12. In the
individual rankings, sophomore Riza Zalameda saw herself drop out
of the rankings after previously having a grasp on the No. 76 spot.
However, not all was bad for the Bruins as senior Laura Gordon
moved into the top 25 with a No. 24 ranking. Joining Gordon in the
climb up the ladder were No. 37 Lin, No. 73 freshman Ashley Joelson
and No. 113 Lind. Ex-Bruin standout Daniela Bercek heads the field
of women with a firm grasp on the No. 1 spot. Bercek’s Duke
Blue Devil teammate and another ex-Bruin, Jackie Carleton, is also
in the top 20, holding possession of the No. 19 ranking. No. 1
Stanford has six players in the top 50 of the national rankings. Of
those six, three are in the top 10.