Oct. 3, 2014
UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa.- The Penn State women's tennis team wrapped up the opening day of the Hokie Invitational on a successful note. Victoria Kisialeva (Toronto, Canada) defeated Catherine Martin of Wofford 6-1, 6-4. Kisialeva moves on to the quarterfinals to take on Natalie Sayer of Radford. Kim Surin (Montreal, Canada) defeated beat Kai Broomfield of Marshall 6-1, 6-2. Surin is set to play Kelly Willford of Virginia Tech in the quarterfinals. Dasha Sapogova (Belarus, Minsk) closed out an undefeated day for the Nittany Lions in the Singles Flight A by advancing to play Cerezo-Codina of Virginia Tech after beating Taylor Pinchoff of James Madison 6-1, 6-2.
In the Singles Flight B, Devan McCluskey (Phoenix, Ariz.) won 7-5, 7-5 over Aya Terashi of Morehead State while Katia Blik (Moscow, Russia) defeated Gemma Valls of Radford 6-3, 4-6, 6-0. Taylor Shukow (Boca Raton, Fla.) advances after beating Emily Bradshaw of James Madison 4-6, 6-4, 6-2 in Singles Flight C. Liyin Xu (Chengdu, China) advanced in Flight D by defeating Taylor Carson of Wofford 6-2, 4-6, 7-5. Kelly Mengel, Melissa Minniti, Hannah Kratky, and Emily Rivers were defeated in their first round singles matches.
In the Doubles Flight A, the team of Surin/McCluskey advanced to the semifinals by defeating Karas/Martin of Wofford 8-4 and Berezhnaya/Burguiere of VCU 8-7 (5). The duo of Blik/Sapogova also advanced to the semifinals after drawing a bye in the first round and beating Hule/Pinchoff of James Madison in the quarterfinals 8-2. Surin/McCluskey will take on Mita/Stoica of Virginia Tech while Blik/Sapogova will battle Kivitashville/Barscheheuskaya of VCU. Shukow/Mengel were defeated in the first round but came back to beat Reid/Sanchez of Wofford 8-7 (5).
"This tournament is a good test against regional opponents," said head coach Chris Cagle. "We had 16 wins today as a team, which is a big showing. It is really nice to see success up and down the lineup. We are looking forward to getting back on the courts tomorrow and having another strong day."
Saturday is the second of three days at the Hokie Invitational. Check out the Facebook page at Penn State Women's Tennis and the Twitter page @pennstateWTEN for all of the latest updates regarding the team.