Women upset Texas despite distractions

Ian C. Meyer Arizona Daily Wildcat Arizona's Vicky Maes returns a shot during the UA women's tennis team's upset of No. 5 Texas at the Robson Tennis Center over the weekend.

The Wildcats upset 5th-ranked Texas, 6-3 on Saturday in the midst of all the carnival attractions and carnival-goers running by the Robson Tennis Center all afternoon.

"There were a couple good songs on and you kind of get them in your head, but it wasn't all that distracting," UA junior Vicky Maes said. "I actually think that it was an advantage to us since we had practiced (with it going on)."

Although it had been nearly a month since Arizona (13-5 overall, 2-4 in the Pacific 10 Conference Southern Division) played an opponent ranked in the top 10, they had little trouble adjusting to Texas' style of play.

"This was a big win for the team in terms of our confidence," UA head coach Becky Bell said.

The Longhorns (12-5 overall, 6-0 in the Big 12 Conference) took an early lead when Laura Berendt outplayed senior Stephanie Sammaritano in straight sets.

The Wildcats fought back to take a 3-1 advantage over Texas after senior Khristen Pietrucha and sophomore Monique Allegre's straight set victories and a three-set win by sophomore Karen Goldstein.

Texas staged a comeback, gaining momentum after Anne Pastor defeated Betsy Miringoff.

Pastor won the first set 7-6, and looked as though she would breeze past Miringoff in the second when she had a 5-2 lead. But UA's junior from San Diego made a game of it winning the next two games, which eventually was not enough.

Miringoff, who has played in six singles matches since rejoining the team in February, did play well enough to please Bell

"She's playing better and better every match," Bell said. "I think she was disappointed that she lost, but what I told her was that at least she got to the point of being in a position to win a tough match."

Maes, Arizona's No. 1, took three sets to get past fifth-ranked Cristina Moros in the afternoon's most crucial match.

Had Maes lost, the score going into doubles play would have been tied at three. Maes' win meant that the Longhorns would have to win all three doubles matches to claim the team victory.

"I think (Maes' win) gave us a lot of momentum," Bell said. "I thought she was really mentally tough today and just fought hard for that victory."

The doubles team of Goldstein and Sammaritano upset Berendt and Sandy Sureephong, the 15th-ranked doubles team in the nation, 8-4 to clinch UA's sixth-consecutive victory.

"You always get to a point where a match could go either way and I think we just played really, really tough when we had to today," Bell said. "When it counted the most, we came through."