Shibahara snags championship title
Two tournaments into Ena Shibahara’s collegiate career, and she’s reached two finals.
This time, the freshman put away her opponent in three sets.
One week removed from a second-place finish at the 2016 Riviera/ITA All-American Championships, Shibahara defeated top-seeded Pepperdine sophomore Luisa Stefani 6-3, 4-6, 7-5 to capture the Oracle ITA Masters title Sunday afternoon.
The second-seeded Shibahara had a chance to win in straight sets when she was up 4-1 in the second, but she dropped five straight games. The match was on serve until Shibahara broke to go up 6-5 in the third, and she served out to win it.
In five matches, the freshman only dropped two sets the entire tournament as she cruised through the 32-player draw. She defeated two top-100 ranked players, No. 74 Gabriela Porubin in the second round and No. 2 Stefani.
UCLA women’s tennis will next compete at the ITA Southwest Regional Championships from Oct. 20-24 in San Diego.
Cross-country delivers results in two invitationals
Many UCLA sports’ seasons are in full swing, but cross-country’s is nearly wrapping up.
Over the weekend, the men’s and women’s cross country teams split squads between the 2016 Nuttycombe Wisconsin Cross Country Invitational and the Santa Clara Bronco Cross Country Invitational, their last meets before the Pac-12 championships next weekend.
Out of 30 and 31 teams in Wisconsin, the men’s and women’s teams finished sixth and 13th, respectively. Senior Ferdinand Edman led the team, finishing 10th overall, with senior Jonah Diaz and redshirt freshman Colin Burke following in 27th and 57th.
On the women’s side, freshman Claire Markey took 25th overall, 42 and 43 places better than sophomore Julia Rizk and sophomore Carolina Johnson, respectively.
Those who didn’t make the trip to Wisconsin drove to Sunnyvale, California, where the men’s seven runners placed second out of 18 teams. Junior Daniel de la Torre took fourth out of 173 runners, and redshirt sophomores Jackson Marshall and Cole Smith and redshirt freshman Millen Trujillo finished in a pack that spanned 14th through 17th place.
The women’s team only ran four runners – sophomore Taylor Taite, junior Emily Fieberling, and freshmen Beckie Alch and Sarah Riggs, who finished sixth, 30th, 78th and 165th, respectively.
The teams will have this week and next week before the conference championships punctuate the end of the season, lest they qualify for NCAAs.