April 10, 2009

Story courtesy of Xavier Sports Information

ROME, Ga. -- The Xavier University of Louisiana women's tennis team defeated Shorter (Ga.) 5-0 Thursday (April 9) for its third victory of the season against a ranked NAIA opponent.

Shorter's 15th-ranked men defeated 13th-ranked Xavier 5-1 to snap the five-match winning streak of the Gold Rush.

The Gold Nuggets (14-5), ranked 16th, beat the 17th-ranked Lady Hawks (9-6) for the second time in a month. In a matchup of ranked doubles teams, Xavier's No. 10 Angelina Callis and Anastesia Opata defeated No. 22 Emmanuelle DeBeaucoudrey and Danielle Monteith 8-3.

Callis, ranked 49th in singles, clinched the dual with a 6-2, 6-2 victory over Monteith.

"Normally our women work their way into a dual match," said Alan Green, coach of Xavier's women and men. "But today they started the match with a lot of intensity and maintained it. They kept it going and closed Shorter out pretty quickly."

The Gold Nuggets are 3-0 against Shorter the past two seasons.

Xavier's men dropped to 0-4 against Shorter the past three seasons. Freshman Sean Richardson scored the only Gold Rush point at No. 6 singles with his 6-3, 6-2 victory over Jordan Hubbard. Remi Bourrat clinched the dual with a 6-4, 6-3 victory over Mikhail Vaval at No. 2 singles.

"You get down 3-0 in doubles in NAIA scoring rules, and that's just too big a deficit to expect your singles lineup to overcome," Green said. "We came out flat and stayed flat throughout doubles.

"But hats off to Shorter -- they took it to us."

Shorter (10-6) won for the fourth time in five duals and snapped the five-match winning streak of Xavier (13-5).

Both Xavier teams will play Union (Ky.) at 2 p.m. EDT Friday at nearby Mount Berry, Ga. Union's men are No. 10 in the NAIA, and the women are 22nd.