The Wildcats’ spirits were low Sunday afternoon after narrowly missing the opportunity to upset No. 8 Michigan.
No. 14 Northwestern hosted both Michigan and Michigan State this weekend. After the Cats fended off the Spartans 6-1 on Saturday, the Wolverines bested NU in a dramatic 4-3 match.
The No. 2 singles match-up between junior Belinda Niu and Michigan’s Ronit Yurovsky lasted more than two hours and ultimately decided the overall match victor. Yurovsky defeated Niu 6-7, 6-2, 7-5, but not without a fight.
The opening set started off poorly for Niu after she faulted several consecutive serves. But Niu quickly regained focus and rallied to win the set in a tiebreaker. The match then went back and forth until Niu hit the final shot out of bounds, handing the win to Yurovsky and the Wolverines.
As if two hours of singles play wasn’t enough for Niu and Yurovsky, they also faced each other in doubles action earlier in the afternoon.
Niu and senior Katie Turvy lost 8-3 at the hands of 49th ranked Yurovsky and Sarah Lee.
No. 9 NU doubles pair, senior Linda Abu Mushrefova and junior Nida Hamilton, also lost, falling to the Wolverines’ No. 2 Emina Bektas and Brooke Bolender 8-6.
NU won only one doubles match, a dominating 8-1 win for the duo of junior Veronica Corning and freshman Alicia Barnett.
Though the Cats struggled Sunday, their weekend got off to a strong start as they pummeled Michigan State 6-1 on Saturday.
The doubles teams wasted no time capturing doubles points, taking only 34 minutes to seal the victory by a combined score of 16-1.
The singles round saw even more NU domination. Turvy, Niu, and Hamilton did not lose more than two combined games in any set in their straight-set romps.
Corning found herself in a battle with the Spartans’ top singles player, junior Marina Bohrer, when Corning dropped the first set. But after winning the second set, Corning was able to put Bohrer away in the superbreaker to win the match.
