UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. - The Big Ten Conference announced their weekly women’s tennis awards on Wednesday afternoon with Maiko Uchijima earning the league’s Player of the Week.
Uchijima placed third at the ITA Northeast Regional singles competition while pairing with Olivia Dorner for a runner-up finish in the doubles tournament at the event. She compiled a 10-2 record across both singles and doubles in Philadelphia.
In singles play, the senior bested Temple's Marianthi Christoforidou, 7-5, 6-3, Delaware's Maryia Hrynashka, 6-2, 6-3, Columbia's Malak El Allami, 7-5, 6-0, and Princeton's Eva Elbaz, 6-1, 5-7, 6-1 to reach the top four.
In the singles semifinals, Uchijima fell to Penn's No. 78 Esha Velaga, who ultimately won the singles championship The Tokyo, Japan native earned third place with a commanding 6-2, 6-4 victory over Columbia's No. 108 Gayathri Krishnan.
Uchijima and Dorner, a fellow senior, reached the doubles championship match for the second straight year after taking home the title in 2024. The pair took down five consecutive opponents en route to this year’s title match.
They defeated Wagner's Liepa Sataite and Alexia Estrada, 8-4, Temple's Thamara Frasser Kawaratani and Christoforidou, 8-0, Penn's Lara Stojanovski and Velaga, 8-4, Princeton's Pearlie Zhang and Tsehay Driscoll, 8-6, and the Tigers' Anna Maria Fedotova and Madeleine Jessup, 6-4, 7-6.
The Penn State women’s tennis team is coming off a highly successful outing at the ITA Northeast Regional that saw 32 total victories. In both singles and doubles, the Nittany Lions represented three of the eight quarterfinalists.
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