Oct. 24, 2007

LUBBOCK, Texas - The Lamar University women's tennis team had an impressive showing, with every participant winning at least one match, at the 2007 Wilson/ITA Regional Championships hosted by Texas Tech University at the McLeod Tennis Center in Lubbock, Texas.

Freshman Mariaryeni Gutierrez continued the impressive beginning to her Lamar University tennis career, leading the way for the Lady Cardinals with a run to the quarterfinals of the singles main draw before bowing out to Baylor's Karolina Filipiak 6-4, 7-5. Her run to the quarterfinals was impressive, as she knocked off six opponents, including three in the qualifying round.

The tournament started with Gutierrez rolling through the qualifying matches, taking out Lainy Chafitz of Texas State 6-1, 6-0 in her first match and No. 3 seed Maria Babanova of TCU 6-1, 6-0 in her second match. In her third match of the qualifying round Gutierrez dismissed No. 5 seed Varsha Shiva-Shankar of Rice 6-1, 6-1. The win gave her a pass to the main draw, where she joined 63 of the top players in the region.

In the main draw Gutierrez continued her run, knocking off Janet Durham of Texas Tech 7-6, 6-2 in her opening match, then taking down Marija Milic of the University of Texas 6-4, 6-3. In her third match of the draw the LU freshman took down No. 7 seed Elze Potgieter of Texas A&M 6-4, 6-3 to advance to the quarterfinals. She was the only player out of the eight that advanced from the qualifying draw to advance as far as the main draw quarterfinals.

Gutierrez was also successful in the doubles main draw, pairing with Andrea Martinez for a run to the quarterfinals. The duo opened the tournament with an 8-6 win over Potgieter and Stephanie Davidson of Texas A&M, and then posted a win over Monika Hadvigerova and Klara Jagosova of UT-Arlington when the Maverick players retired the match. In their third match of the draw the Lamar pair downed the No. 3 seed Vanja Corovic and Milic of the University of Texas 8-5, before falling to the No. 4 seed Megan Falcon and Staten Spencer of LSU in the quarterfinals.

The Lady Cardinals other doubles team, made up of Salina Aranda and Manami Kuroda, posted a opening round victory over Lucy Forward and Leila Salek of the University of Houston, winning 8-2. The pair was eliminated in the next round by the eventual runner up and No. 1 ranked tandem of Macall Harkins and Anna Sydorska of TCU 8-1.

Martinez was the only other Lady Cardinals player to play in the singles main draw, losing a hard fought battle in her opening round match 4-6, 6-3, 6-4 to Michelle Sammons of Texas A&M. She rebounded in her first round of the consolation bracket, knocking out Kseniia Tokarieva of SMU 6-1, 6-3 before falling to Dominique Karas of Rice 6-2, 6-2.

Maria Gutierrez posted Lamar's only other opening round victory in the singles qualifying draw, taking out Idalina Franca of North Texas 6-3, 1-6, 7-6. In her second round match, Maria Gutierrez was defeated by Eleonora Kuruc of Sam Houston State 6-3, 6-2.

Aranda and Kuroda each dropped their opening round matches in the qualifying draw before picking up a wins in the consolation bracket.

Aranda was knocked out of the qualifying draw with a 7-5, 7-5 loss to Ingrid Ballus of Texas Tech. In her first match of the consolation, Aranda defeated No. 6 seed Catalina Cruz of North Texas 7-6, 4-6, 10-8 before falling to Stephanie Willerding of UT-Pan American 7-5, 2-6, 12-10.

Kuroda dropped her opening match of the qualifying draw 6-3, 6-2 to Monica Neveklovska of SMU. In her opening match of the consolation bracket she defeated Ximena Fuentes of UTPA 6-2 6-3 before falling to Lynley Wasson of UH 6-1, 6-3.

Lady Cardinals tennis will be back in action on Friday, when they travel to Hattiesburg, Miss. for the Southern Miss. Fall Classic.