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Results
CALIFORNIA (Oct. 1) – The California University of Pennsylvania trio of juniors
Nina Kowalski (Hofheim, Germany/Man Taunus) and
Laurie Navarro (Eysus, France/Jules Supervielle) and sophomore
Alina Stanila (Alexandria, Romania/Technical) all qualified for the Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) National Small College Championships after winning flights at the ITA Atlantic Regional Championship, which concluded on Thursday at the new tennis complex at Roadman Park.
Kowalski and Navarro qualified for the national tournament after winning the doubles title at the regional tournament, while Stanila captured the singles crown on the final day of the tournament. The ITA National Championships will be played in Mobile, Ala., on Oct. 15-18. This marks the fifth-straight year in which a Vulcan doubles team has won the regional championship and fourth-consecutive season in which a Vulcan singles player has won the regional championship.
In singles action, Stanila earned the title with a perfect 5-0 record after defeating Kowalski in the championship match, 6-2, 6-4, on Thursday. Stanila earned a first-round bye after entering the tournament as the No. 1 seed. In her first match, she won 6-0, 6-0 against Kristen Bonito of Bloomsburg before posting a 10-4 victory over teammate
Anastassiya Zherdeva (Almaty, Kazakhstan) in the third round. The 5-6 sophomore then dealt Slippery Rock’s Laura Handy a 10-2 loss in the quarterfinals and collected a 10-0 victory in the semifinals against Nicole Andreini of West Virginia Wesleyan.
Kowalski, the fourth-seeded singles player in the tournament, registered a 4-1 record and lost only a combined three games in her four victories. In the quarterfinals, she posted an 8-1 win over Navarro before claiming an 8-2 victory against teammate
Axelle Fernandez (Nice, France/Institut Familial) in the semifinals.
Second-seeded Fernandez finished with a 3-1 mark at the tournament, while Navarro posted a 2-1 mark in the singles flight.
In doubles play, Kowalski and Navarro claimed the title with a 5-0 record after defeating The Rock’s Handy and Dunja Drmac in the finals. Kowalski and Navarro entered the tournament unseeded and collected an 8-6 win over teammates Zherdeva and
Galina Vishnikina (Almaty, Kazakhstan/Sport Military) in the quarterfinals.
Stanila and Fernandez, the top doubles seed in the tournament, posted a pair of victories before losing in the semifinals, 8-4.
The Vulcans continue their fall season next Saturday, Oct. 10, when they begin play in the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference (PSAC) Individual Championships, hosted by Shippensburg.