Box Score
Samford Stats
SoCon Tournament BracketCHATTANOOGA, Tenn. -- The Samford University women's tennis team earned its first Southern Conference regular-season title in school history Saturday as the Bulldogs battled to a hard-fought 7-0 road victory against the previous undefeated Chattanooga Mocs in a league championship match held at the UTC Tennis Courts.
Samford (13-8, 7-0 SoCon) joined the SoCon in 2008 and also notched its first undefeated conference season Saturday. The Bulldogs will be the top seed in next week's 2015 SoCon Tournament, which we be held April 24-26 and co-hosted by Furman University and Wofford University.
Samford is slated to face the eighth-seeded Mercer Bears at 8 a.m. (CDT) on Friday at the Mickel Tennis Center in Greenville, South Carolina.
On Saturday, the Bulldogs garnered the early momentum of the showdown by winning the doubles point and taking a 1-0 advantage over
Chattanooga (17-3, 5-1 SoCon). The Mocs earned the first victory, 8-2, on court No. 3, but then Samford bounced back with triumphs of 8-2 and 8-6, respectively, on courts No. 2 and No. 1.
The Bulldogs' rally started in doubles play on court No. 1 as Samford's pairing of
Stephanie N'tcha and
Carita Moolman tallied an 8-6 victory over the Mocs' combination of Kayla Jones and Samantha Caswell, 8-6. With their win, they evened the doubles score at 1-1 and improved their record on the year to 14-5.
Samford clinched the doubles point on court No. 2 where the Bulldogs' pairing of
Yasmeen Ebada and
Jessica Northcutt finished the season with a perfect 7-0 league record by defeating Chattanooga's Kelsey Coots and Kaylene Chadwell, 8-2.
In doubles play this season, Samford boasts a brilliant 17-4 SoCon record, while Ebada and Northcutt closed out their dual-match campaign at 14-3.
Despite battling in front of 160 raucous yellow and blue-clad fans Saturday, the Bulldogs continued their stellar play in the singles competition and ended up sweeping all six courts to close out their 7-0 league win.
In singles, Samford's Moolman and Wood both extended their identical winning streaks to eight-consecutive matches with straight-set victories.
Wood rolled to a 6-0, 6-2 triumph on court No. 6, while Moolman registered a 6-4, 6-2 win over Chattanooga's Caswell in the No. 4 singles contest. With their respective victories, Wood improved her dual-match record to 12-5 as Moolman upped her mark to 15-3.
Samford's Ebada and Northcutt also tallied straight-set wins in Saturday's singles contest to clinch the Bulldogs' victory and the SoCon regular-season title.
Ebada, the reigning SoCon Player of the Week, defeated the Mocs' Coots, 6-4, 6-1, to improve her dual-match record to 12-9, while Northcutt moved to 11-9 this season with a 6-2, 6-0 victory over Chattanooga's Chadwell.
In the closest two singles matches of the day, Samford's
Stephanie N'tcha rallied back to defeat Jones on court No. 1, 3-6, 7-6 (7), 1-0 (5), and
Iva Parapunova held off the Mocs' Claire Mulyadi on court No. 5. Mulyadi was forced to retire in the second set of action.
With Saturday's win, the Bulldogs improved to 14-12 all-time against Chattanooga. Samford has been victorious in eight of its last nine meetings between the teams.
The regular-season SoCon champion Samford University women's tennis team will next be in action Friday at 8 a.m. (CDT) as the top-seeded Bulldogs square off against the eighth-seeded Mercer Bears in the first round of the SoCon Tournament being held in Greenville, South Carolina.
Box Score
Samford Stats
SoCon Tournament Bracket
