The UW-Whitewater women’s tennis team stays blazing hot as they dominated two WIAC foes, UW-Stout and UW-River Falls Saturday, Oct. 18. The Warhawks swept their final conference matches of the fall with a cumulative score of 14-0.
It took a team effort to close out the fall season on a high note.
“We just wanted to go in and compete to the best of our abilities. And I think we did that,” senior captain Megan Griswold said. “I think for the team, everyone had great energy and competed really well against these teams and it ended up going our way.”
In the doubles matches, the Warhawks set an early tone by sweeping all three rounds to get the team point against UW-Stout. Crystina Lee and Molly Asfeld blanked their opponents during the second flight for a 6-0 victory. Gracie Ha and Abby Weaver matched that performance by blanking their opponents later in the day against UW-River Falls.
“The chemistry on the team overall has been awesome, and everyone’s been super uplifting to each other,” Weaver said. “That just correlates to how we’re playing right now at the end of the season.”
The Warhawks continued their dominance in the singles rounds as no player dropped over three games in a single set.
In the first match against UW-Stout, junior Ashley Adkisson came out on top with a 6-0, 6-0 victory. Against UW-River Falls, Ha took the top singles flight 6-1, 6-1. Weaver took the second flight 6-0, 6-2. Freshman Kaitlyn Remke rounded it out by taking the third flight 6-0, 6-1.
“We were very patient. We were in control of all of our matches today in terms of what we could control,” head coach Byron Balkin said.
While UW-W faced tough competition, they weren’t fazed whatsoever.
“Just keep realizing that they’re good players and that we just have to adapt to how they play and use that to go forward,” Weaver said.
Other Warhawks echoed that sentiment, acknowledging the tough competition that they’ve faced while realizing they have what it takes to compete at a high level.
“We have to compete against everybody and we just need to go out there and take what’s given to us and play our best,” Griswold said.
As the fall season has progressed, team chemistry continues to grow. The athletes have found their place within the program and are used to the day-to-day grind of collegiate athletics. Nobody knows this better than Balkin.
“We work hard every day, we emphasize being great teammates and having good sportsmanship,” Balkin said. “They’ve all done a good job and know what we’re all about.”
The Warhawks wrap up the fall season with a trip to Madison for the Wisconsin Tennis Classic Individual Tournament Oct. 26.
