Juniors Hannah Kassaie and Lily McCloskey of the Case Western Reserve University women's tennis team advanced to the final day of the ITA Fall Central Regional Championship with their performances on Saturday at the Dwight Davis Tennis Center in St. Louis on campus of Washington University in St. Louis.
Kassaie and McCloskey, the top-seeded duo in the doubles draw, reached the semifinals with a pair of wins. To start the day, the partnership defeated ninth-seeded Ainsley Heidbreder and Nina Moravek of WashU 8-2 in the round of 16. They followed that with an 8-5 win over fifth-seeded Abigail Penados and Natalie Bassett of North Central in the quarterfinals. Kassaie and McCloskey will face eighth-seeded Rena Lin and Oliwia Mikos of Chicago in the semifinal. On the other side of the draw, the second-seeded Chicago duo of Sylwia Mikos and Shianna Guo will face the ninth-seeded partnership of WashU's Amber Edmonds and Eliana Hanna.
Kassaie also reached the semifinals of the singles tournament with two wins. Seeded third in the draw, Kassaie defeated Otterbein's Erin Storrer 6-1, 6-1 in the round of 16. In the quarterfinal, she bested eighth-seeded Olivia Mikos 6-3, 0-6, 6-3. In the semifinal tomorrow at 12 p.m. she will take on Eleni Lazaridou of Kenyon. In the other semifinal, Sylwia Mikos will play ninth-seeded Allaire Berl.
Seniors Katherine Wang and Pallavi Goculdas also competed in the doubles tournament on Saturday, advancing to the quarterfinals with an 8-6 victory over the unseeded duo of Natalie Connelly and Ana Brand of Kenyon. With a spot in the semifinals on the line, Wang and Goculdas fell to Slywia Mikos and Guo 8-3.
The seventh-seeded Spartan pair of sophomore Katalina Wang and junior Radha Patel fell in the round of 16 to the ninth-seeded Chicago duo of Sarena Biria and Brooke Pedersen 8-6.
In the singles bracket, seventh-seeded McCloskey advanced to the quarterfinals of the draw with a 6-2, 6-0 win over Bassett. However, she fell to Slywia Mikos, the top seed in the draw, in the quarterfinal 3-6, 2-6 to end her singles run.
Patel, seeded ninth in the singles draw, upset fifth-seeded Gao 6-7 (9-11), 6-3, 6-3 to advance to the quarterfinal. However, she fell to ninth-seeded Berl 3-6, 3-6.
CWRU student-athletes won two of the four singles "color" draws on Saturday. Fourth-seeded senior Chloe Ku defeated second-seeded Randi Hendricks 6-3, 3-6 10-4 to advance to the final match of the blue draw. She then upset the top seed, Kristen Ahn of Lake Forest College, 7-5, 1-6, 10-3 to claim the bracket. Top-seeded sophomore Elsa Syed won the green draw with a 6-1, 6-3 semifinal win over fourth-seeded Katie Finerman of WashU and a 6-3, 6-0 win in the finals over Hope's Miyako Coffey.
Sophomore Asha Shukla and junior Anna Kan both fell in the semifinals of their draws.
In the consolation doubles bracket, Shukla and Kan reached the quarterfinals with two wins, besting a partnership from John Carroll to start the day and a duo from DePauw in the round of 16. They are scheduled to face Storrer and Lillia Walter at 8 a.m. on Sunday
ITA Regional action concludes tomorrow with the doubles semifinals to be played at 8 a.m. followed by the final at 10:30 a.m. The singles semifinals are scheduled to start at 12 p.m. with the final scheduled for 3 p.m. If any Spartan reaches the final of the main draw, they will receive an invitation to the ITA Cup in October in Rome, Georgia.
