BOX SCORE

ROCK HILL, SC—The Lady Eagles tennis team wins the 2013 Big South Championship with a 4-0 victory over No. 2 seed Charleston Southern. This is Winthrop's sixth consecutive Big South Women's Tennis title and has won 11 of the past 12 conference championships. Big South Coach of the Year Cid Carvalho has now won 16 conference titles. The Lady Eagles won the regular season title and was the top overall seed in the tournament.

Sophomore Ekin Gunaysu (Ankara, Turkey) and Freshman Caitlin Cridland (Perth, Australia) took down Marketa Placha and Susita Das of Charleston So., 8-1, at No. 3 doubles. Freshman Alice Garcia (Brasilia, Brazil) and Giovanna Portiolli (Curitiba, Brazil) could not close the door on the doubles point, falling to Yvonne Hubler and Alexandra Walters, 8-4.

Doubles point was decided at No. 1 doubles in a hard-fought match that went into a tie breaker. Senior Yasmine Alkema (Algiers, Algeria) and Junior Andressa Garcia (Sao Paulo, Brazil) went back and forth with Charleston Southern's Angelica Sidorenko and Alia Nour. Sidorenko and Nour came back from a 7-4 Winthrop advantage to win four straight games to take an 8-7 lead in the match. Alkema and Garcia fought back to force the match into a tie breaker. Alkema and Garcia were down 4-1 in the tie breaker with Sidorenko and Nour. Alkema and Garcia prevailed and came back to win the tie breaker 7-5; giving Winthrop the doubles point. 

Yasmine Alkema kept the doubles momentum rolling by defeating Marketa Placha, 6-3, 6-1, at No. 1 singles. Shortly after, Alice Garcia defeated Angelica Sidorenko 6-2, 6-3, at No. 3 singles. Almost simultaneously as Alice Garcia won, Tijana Uzelac (Belgrade, Serbia) clinched the match at No. 6 singles with a 6-0, 6-3 win over Susita Das.

Andressa Garcia was leading Yvonne Hubler 6-1, 5-4, at No. 2 singles. In the No. 4 position, Giovanna Portiolli was leading 5-4 over Alexandra Walters. Caitlin Cridland was tied 6-6 with Alia Nour at No. 5 singles.

"First I would like to congradulate CSU for a great season. The doubles point was very exciting with both teams having match points." said Coach Carvalho. "Our players played outstanding today, I'm so proud of them. We are going to enjoy this win for a couple of days and then start preparing for the NCAAs. Go Eagles!"

The Lady Eagles get an automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament with the win. The Lady Eagles will find out where they are headed in the NCAA tournament on May 6^th during the Selection Show.