Canes Reach Sweet 16 for Seventh Consecutive Season

May 12, 2012

CORAL GABLES, Fla. – With its 4-0 victory over No. 37 Utah on Saturday at the Neil Schiff Tennis Center, the 11th-ranked University of Miami women’s tennis team advanced to the NCAA Tournament’s third round for the seventh straight season.

Playing at Nos. 1 and 2 singles respectively, seniors Anna Bartenstein and Gabriela Mejia won their matches simultaneously to clinch the victory for the Canes.

Mejia, the nation’s 27th-ranked singles player, closed out the Utes’ Sarah Pham, 6-2, 6-1. Just moments later, No. 18 Bartenstein finished off Utah’s No. 54 Anastasia Putilina, 6-0, 6-2.

Sophomore Melissa Bolivar, who on Friday, clinched the Canes’ win over UNF with a three-set win, was the first UM singles player to win on Saturday. Easily taking down Utah’s Danielle Flores, 6-1, 6-0.

Bartenstein and Brittany Dubins were the first doubles team to win, as they overpowered Utah’s duo of Pham and Lucia Kovarcikova at No. 3, 8-3. The 20th-ranked tandem of Bolivar and Liat Zimmerman later clinched the doubles point with an 8-6 win.

Miami will face ACC foe and 7th-seeded North Carolina at the University of Georgia’s Dan Magill Tennis Complex, in Athens, Ga. on Thursday, May 17 at 7 p.m.The Hurricanes and Tar Heels battled it out on the court on April 7 in Chapel Hill, N.C., resulting in a difficult 4-3 loss for UM. In that match, Mejia, Bartenstein and Lileikite each won their singles points, but the Tar Heels claimed the doubles point and earned victories at Nos. 4, 5 and 6, clinching the ACC Tournament’s No. 2 seed.

Order of finish: Doubles (2,3); Singles (4,2,1)