The UC Davis women’s tennis team sent a couple of players down to Berkeley to compete at the Cal Nike Invitational this past weekend to test their abilities against strong Northern California competition.
Junior Megan Heneghan, who has played at the No. 1 singles slot for the Aggies consistently in her first two years, advanced to the second round before getting taken down by the sixth-seeded player from Saint Mary’s.
“Megan has a shot at getting ranked this year,” head coach Bill Maze said. “She’s played high up for the past year, and she has a chance at making the NCAA tournament this year.”
Heneghan played in the 32-person Gold singles bracket, which was the top flight of the tournament. After losing in the second round, Heneghan dominated a Sacramento State player 6-0, 6-2.
Senior Lauren Curry, junior Nicole Koehly and sophomore Layla Sanders all competed in the Blue Flight singles. Unfortunately, none of them could get past the round of 32. Curry split sets but was unable to pull out the third, and fell by a score of 4-6, 6-4, 6-3. Sanders won the first set against a San Jose State player, but dropped the next two and the match by a 2-6, 6-3, 6-3 mark. Koehly was beaten by the third seed from Fresno State by a score of 6-2, 6-3.
But the Aggies were not done competing. In the consolation rounds of the Blue Flight singles competition, Sanders came out on top in four straight matches en route to winning the back draw, with a 6-3, 6-4 victory in the final over a Saint Mary’s player. Sanders rallied back from a 4-1 deficit in the second set to claim the victory.
One more UC Davis player, Ellie Edles, had a strong showing at the Cal Nike Invite. The Costa Mesa, Calif. native advanced to the finals of the White ITA singles flight before losing to Brooke Irish from USF.
“It’s nice to make the finals for anyone, for both Layla and Ellie,” Maze said. “It’s good to get some good results in the first tournament back.”
The Aggies also participated in the doubles competition, with the two tandems of Curry/Koehly and Heneghan/Sanders both advancing to the quarterfinals before falling. Both UC Davis doubles teams were eliminated by doubles teams from Cal.
“It’s a tough tournament and there are no easy matches,” Maze said. “We were just going to get some matches under our belt, and it’s going to get better as we go on.”
MATTHEW YUEN can be reached at sports@theaggie.org.
