TULSA, Oklahoma – The No. 44-ranked University of Denver women's tennis team (18-4) won its ninth-consecutive Summit League Championship with a 4-0 sweep of North Dakota on Saturday.
DU has now won the Summit League tournament title every season since joining the league in 2013-14 (excluding 2020 when the championship was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic).
This is Denver's 11
th overall conference tournament title when adding in Sun Belt Conference tournament championships in 2004 and 2008.
Doubles:
Denver began its hot start with its fourth-straight win of the doubles point. Freshmen
Caroline Driscoll and
Louise Wikander broke twice in the first four games of the No. 3 match before closing it out in less than half an hour.
In No. 2 doubles, freshman
Claudia Martinez de Velasco and sophomore
Andrea Burguete Beltran traded breaks three times throughout the match before taking a lead at 6-5 and holding for the 7-5 win to give the point to Denver.
Senior
Britt Pursell and fifth-year student
Taylor Melville also traded breaks early in their No. 1 doubles match and remained on serve afterward, sitting at 5-6 when the double point was clinched.
Singles:
DU carried momentum into singles, winning the opening game of all six singles matches on its way to three straight-sets wins to claim the title. Across the three matches that were completed, Denver dropped just three combined games.
Melville kicked off things with four consecutive breaks through the first set and the start of the second. She conceded a break in the third game of the second set before breaking right back and adding a second break for 5-1. She would serve it out to put DU up 2-0 overall.
Pursell captured a double-bagel victory in No. 3 singles – her second and third 6-0 sets of the tournament. Less than two minutes later, Burguete Beltran would clinch Denver's win, finishing with her own bagel in the second set. She broke three times in each of her two sets at No. 2 singles.
At No. 4 singles, Wikander started with a break in her first game on the way to a 6-2 opening-set win. She held a two-break lead early in the second set before giving one back but was up 4-2 when the match went unfinished.
Driscoll rebounded from her loss to North Dakota's Nore Heinitz just a week ago, breaking in her first two return games for a 6-2 first-set win this time. The match was left on serve at 1-2 in the second set.
Martinez de Velasco twice went up a break in the first set at No. 6 singles, eventually taking it, 6-4. She also started the second set with a break and was up 3-0 when the title was clinched, leaving the match unfinished.
Up Next:
Denver has clinched a team berth in the 2023 NCAA National Championship tournament and will await its placement in the bracket, which will be announced during the 2023 NCAA Women's Tennis Selection Show, set for Monday, May 1, at 4 p.m. MT.
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