Kentucky women’s tennis traveled to Alabama this weekend to take on No.12 Auburn and Alabama to begin SEC play, falling to both teams with respective scores of 5-2 and 6-1.
The Wildcats struggled early in each match, losing the doubles point to fall in an early 1-point deficit.
At No. 12 Auburn, Kentucky’s singles play simply could not keep up with Tigers who have four ranked players.
Lizzy Stevens, who plays at No.1 singles for the Cats, proved no match for Auburn’s No. 13 Carolyn Ansari, falling 1-6 in straight sets to give the Tigers the 2-0 lead.
Auburn’s No.73 Ariana Arseneault took down Lidia Gonzalez 6-3, 6-2 to put the Tigers within one of the win.
Ellie Myers kept Kentucky’s hopes alive with a 7-6(9-7), 6-0 win on court six, but it was not enough as No. 77 DJ Bennett defeated Ellie Eades to give Auburn the win.
The remaining matches were played out, making the final score 5-2 in favor of Auburn.
On the second stop of the weekend, the Wildcats went head-to-head against No.13 Alabama hoping to bounce back and gain their first SEC win of the season.
The match started with the Cats dropping the doubles point to Alabama (11-1, 2-0 SEC) on courts one and three. Alabama’s Ola Pitak and Klara Milicevic started the scoring with a 6-2 victory over UK’s Zoe Hammond and Myers.
Alabama claimed the doubles point on court one as No. 37 Anne Marie Hiser and Loudmilla Bencheikh took down Gonzalez and Eades 6-2.
For singles, Hiser from Alabama increased the team score to 2-0 with a 6-0, 6-2 victory over Eades on court three.
Alabama continued to grow its lead from Sedlackova taking down Gonzalez on court two with scores of 6-3, 6-1.
Freshman Julia Zhu fought to get Kentucky on the board with an impressive singles win on court five. Zhu dominated in both sets against Milicevic, winning 6-3 in the first set and 6-2 in the second.
With three singles matches still playing, Kentucky battled strong on all three courts.
However, it was not enough as the clinching point came from a tough nail-biter on court one as Bencheikh took down Stevens in a second-set tiebreaker 7-5, 7-6 to win the match.
The remaining matches continued on courts four and six, with Hammond, who has had an impressive sophomore season, falling to Alabama’s Pitak 5-1 in a third-set tiebreaker.
Parkhomenko then finished off the day with a 3-6, 6-2, 6-3 victory on court six over Myers, making the final score 6-1 and moving Kentucky to 6-5 on the season.
The Cats will return home Sunday, March 10, to face off with Vanderbilt inside the Hilary J. Boone Varsity Tennis Complex, hoping to gain their first SEC win of the season. The match is slated to begin at noon EST.
