The monkey is off Roger Matalonga's back.

Last Saturday, with his Wildcats deadlocked at three sets apiece versus No. 28 Southern California, the freshman from Terrassa, Spain failed to put away Trojan Ruben Torres, sending Arizona to its seventh consecutive loss.

Fast-forward one week to Saturday and the Wildcats find themselves in a similar situation, this time against the 11th-ranked Washington Huskies. Desperately needing a win to secure a wide berth for the Pacific-10 Championship, the No. 52 Wildcats got behind early, dropping all three doubles matches to go down 0-1.

The persistent Wildcats would recover though, reflecting the growing confidence of a team coming off of two victories earlier in the week against Northern Arizona on Wednesday and Oregon on Friday. Four of the Wildcats' six singles matches would go to first set tiebreakers, with Arizona, including Matalonga, winning three of the four.

Arizona would fend off the offensive firepower of the Huskies, taking five of the six singles matches to the full three sets. The Wildcats took the lead, 2-1, for the first time after victories from Daniel Andrus and Paul Warkentin, and as team captain Carl Hagman defeated No. 19 Matt Hanlin, 7-5, 4-6, and 6-4 in a grueling match, the Wildcats began to sense an upset.

With two matches to play and Arizona needing one victory, once again the fate of the Wildcats rested on the shoulders of Matalonga. A win over the highly ranked Huskies would almost assure Arizona a position into the Pacific-10 Championships.

Matalonga traded 7-6 sets with Washington's Christoph Palmanshofer, setting up a final set to determine a winner. Unlike the previous Saturday, Matalonga came out strong in the third set against Palmanshofer, avenging himself and capturing the upset for the Wildcats, 4-3.

"It was so important to get the win today, after losing to USC last week," said Matalonga after the match. The win for Matalonga increases the freshman's record to 12-4 on the year.

"That was the best win we've had in a long time," said head coach Bill Wright.

Wright said he feels the confidence in his young squad growing with this week's wins over the Huskies, Ducks and Lumberjacks.

"I am happy with our performance, and to get a win makes it that much better," he said.

Arizona moves to 8-8 overall on the year and 2-2 in Pac-10 play.

One of the three losses of the afternoon came at the expense of Arizona's Whi Kim. Rebounding from an abdominal strain that sidelined the junior for the match against Northern Arizona, Kim lost an arduous battle to No. 8 ranked Alex Vlaski, 7-6, 3-6, 5-7. Kim, Arizona's number one singles player, fought the hard-hitting southpaw in an emotional see-saw bout but failed to put the sophomore from Belgrade, Yugoslavia away in the third set tiebreaker.

Wright said he is impressed with the progress and development of Kim this season. The veteran coach feels that Kim has made significant strides in his game over the past few months and is confident the junior will only continue to improve and lead his young talented squad.

Arizona will round out the remaining three games of its season starting this weekend at California and Stanford. The following weekend, the Wildcats will return home to face Arizona State in a match that proves to be a tune-up for the Pac-10 championships the following week.