Results

BLOOMSBURG, Pa. - The Slippery Rock University women's tennis program had a successful start to the 2024 ITA Atlantic Region Championships Friday at the Burt Reese Tennis Center in Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania.
 
Following the first day of competition, SRU will send two teams into the quarterfinals of the doubles bracket and five athletes into the singles tournament Round of 32 on Saturday.
 
Day one of ITA Atlantic Region Championships began with the first two rounds of doubles competition.
 
As they have done for the majority of the opening stages of the season, Alissia Kivi and Nicole Kempton – the No. 3 seeded team in this weekend's tournament - cruised to a pair of victories in the form of a 6-0 shutout of Davis & Elkins' Fabienne Lahn and Erin Laubscher followed by a 6-1 triumph against Jennifer McDonald and Alexis Quackenbush of Bloomsburg.
 
Kivi and Kempton, who have won eight of their nine matches as a team this year, head to Saturday's quarterfinals will they meet Lieselotte Hartlöhner and Annemiek Sterk of Indiana (Pa.) in a battle of PSAC West standouts.
 
One of the most successful Slippery Rock pairings in recent memory, Dari Sakhanova and Tina Slovak also punched their tickets to the quarterfinals by way of wins against Lauren Ceballos and Alyssa Kush of Frostburg State (6-1) in the opening round and Bloomsburg's Alyssa Mazurek and Nicole Ilkovic in the Round of 16.
 
Now occupants of a 35-14 career record as a team, Sakhanova and Slovak will look to keep their championship hopes alive with a victory over the second-seeded duo of Filippa Larsson and Sofia Krasikova out of Charleston.  
 
The lone blemish for The Rock's doubles entries Friday was a narrow 7-5 setback by Amaia Balaguer Brau and Georgie Lancaster against West Virginia Wesleyan's tandem of Dominique Van Vuuren and Sneha Sundaraneedi. Lancaster and Balaguer Brau had entered the weekend as the doubles draw No. 8 seed.
 
Furter success came for SRU as the event shifted focus to the singles draw starting with top-seeded Balaguer Brau downing Alexandra Cave of West Chester 6-2, 6-3 for her third win of 2024. Balaguer Brau continues her title push versus Ceballos Saturday in the Round of 32.
 
Kivi followed suit with a convincing 6-1, 6-0 victory against Edinboro's Cecilia Carayol. The freshman sensation, and No. 10 seed in the tournament, improved her singles record to 4-1 heading into Saturday's second round contest against Bloomsburg's Dasha Nakonechna.
 
As the eighth seed, Kempton made sure not to fall victim to a first-round upset by way of a 6-1, 6-3 win over Cal's Leandra Guldimann to jump into Saturday's Round of 32 bout vs. Ilkovic.
 
The Rock's seeded entries continued to roll as No. 14 Sakhanova outlasted Amanda Menendez Thomasson of West Virginia State for hard-earned 4-6, 7-5, 10-4 result, moving her into the Round of 32 to face Teddi Isherwood of California (Pa.).
 
Sakhanova joins Kivi and Kempton with matching 4-1 singles records on the year.
 
Rounding out The Rock's singles competitors were Lancaster, Slovak and Marika Kempinski.
 
Despite being an unseeded entry, Lancaster earned a spot in the Round of 32 by beating Maria Salome Molina (Salem) 6-7, 7-6, 10-8 in what was the closest match of the opening round. Lancaster's win paves the way for a second-round match against Krasikova, who's the second seed of the singles bracket.  
 
Kempinski dropped her opening-round match to sixth-seeded Michelle Connor of Charleston 6-0, 6-0 while Slovak just came short of upsetting Hartlohner, the tournament's fifth seed, in a 6-4, 1-6, 10-6 loss.
 
Day two of ITA Atlantic Region Championships will begin 9 a.m. Saturday. The doubles quarterfinals as well as singles Round of 32 and Round of 16 will be contested.
 
 
 
 

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