CMS Women's Tennis Has Six of Eight in ITA West Region Singles Quarterfinals

CLAREMONT, Calif. - The Claremont-Mudd-Scripps women's tennis team had six players advance to the ITA West Region Quarterfinals with two wins on Friday, and the six Athenas will all play each other on Saturday morning for the right to advance to the semifinal round.

Audrey Yoon and Ella Brissett will meet in one quarterfinal, Lily Walther and Alisha Chulani will face each other in a second, and Sena Selby and Lindsay Eisenman will play in a third.

Walther, Chulani, Selby and Eisenmann are all in one half of the bracket, guaranteeing that the Athenas will have at least one finalist (and at least one qualifier for the ITA Cup in Rome, Georgia in two weeks). 

In addition, CMS has one doubles team in each of the four quarterfinals, with a chance to duplicate last year's feat of having the ITA West Region Semifinals featuring nothing but Athenas. 

Eisenman is the No. 2 seed in the singles bracket and she opened up in dominant fashion, winning her two matches 6-1, 6-1 (over Anna Tanaka of Caltech) and 6-1, 6-2 (over Alexandra Coleman of Pomona-Pitzer). She faces Selby next, who defeated Sara Beckman of UC Santa Cruz 6-2, 6-0 and then defeated teammate Muduo Zhou 6-2, 6-3, ater Zhou won her opening match 6-4, 6-0 over Kala Komanduri of Colorado College. 

Chulani battled through her opening match, defeating Sofia Kalyva of Pomona-Pitzer 7-5, 6-2 before beating Kiana Brady of Redlands 6-2, 6-4 in the round of 16. Walther knocked off No. 5 seed Marissa Markey of Pomona-Pitzer in the second round 4-6, 6-1, 10-4 after a 6-4, 6-3 win over Kristina Lee of Occidental in the first round. 

Brissett started off her day with a 6-1, 6-1 win over Meghana Damohipurapu of UC Santa Cruz and then defeated Yuiko Rayna Sugai of Redlands 6-1, 6-4. She will face Yoon in the quarterfinals, after Yoon won 6-1, 6-2 over Elina Shalaev of Occidental in the first round, and then came back to defeat Letixia Bazua of Pomona-Pitzer 6-7, 6-0, 10-5. 

The only quarterfinal without an Athena sees top-seeded Angie Zhou of Pomona-Pitzer facing Maegan Deng of Redlands. Deng edged Anna Petrescu of the Athenas in a tight second set in the first round (6-1, 7-5), while Zhou defeated Jade Haller of CMS in the second round 6-2, 6-3, after Haller opened with a 6-2, 6-1 win over Sydney la of Chapman. 

In doubles, top seeded Brissett and Eisenman rolled to an 8-0 over Occidental and an 8-1 win over Chapman in their first two matches. Selby and Haller opened with an 8-0 win over Chapman and followed with an 8-4 win over Redlands.  Chulani and Yoon earned an 8-3 win over Redlands and an 8-1 win over Pomona-Pitzer, while Katherine Wurster and Walther earned an 8-0 win over UC Santa Cruz and an 8-3 win over Pomona-Pitzer. 

The quarterfinal rounds will get started on Saturday morning at 8:30 a.m., weather permitting.