WSU women’s tennis traveled to Stanford this weekend to take part in the 2021 ITA Northwest Regional at the Taube Tennis Center.

The regional tournament brought players from across the west coast including Washington, San Jose State, UC Berkeley, Sacramento State, Portland State, Oregon and many others.

The tournament began on Friday with the first rounds of the women’s singles draw. The doubles bracket was supposed to start on Friday as well but was postponed to Saturday due to rain.

WSU’s Savanna Ly-Nguyen put up a pair of victories to advance to the third round of the singles draw. In the second round, Ly-Nguyen beat No. 16 seed, Nika Zupancic of Washington, in a tie-breaker set, 6-4, 0-6, 7-6.

Sophomore Cougar Fifa Kumhom fell in the second round against Myah Petchey of Oregon after three hard-fought sets, 6-4, 5-7, 6-2.

Freshman Maxine Murphy lost her first-round match against St. Mary’s Lene Hovda in two sets, 6-1, 6-1. 

Play continued on Saturday with the start of the doubles bracket and the later rounds of the singles bracket. 

Ly-Nguyen began Saturday with a win, advancing to the fourth round of the singles tournament to face the No. 6 seed, Stanford’s Angelica Blake. In the match against Blake, Ly-Nguyen lost two sets in a row, 6-1, 7-6. 

WSU entered the doubles bracket with two pairs of Cougars: Ly-Nguyen and Kumhom and the pair of Yang Lee and Murphy. 

Ly-Nguyen and Kumhom made it to the second round after a decisive victory over Simran Chhabra and Mya Bui of San Francisco. In the second round, Ly-Nguyen and Kumhom lost to Cal’s Makenna Thiel and Hannah Viller Moeller, 6-2.

Lee and Murphy did not fare any better, losing in the first round to another Cal duo featuring Jessica Alsola and Erin Richardson, 6-4.

With the losses on Saturday, WSU women’s tennis was eliminated from championship contention. 

In the consolation bracket, Murphy was defeated by Pacific’s Mia-Angelina Ruja in two sets, 6-2, 6-3. Kumhom lost to Portland’s Aleksandra Dimitrijevic in a close match, 7-5, 6-4.

Stanford’s Blake, who defeated Ly-Nguyen in the fourth round of play, advanced to the quarter-finals. Blake lost to the No. 4 seed Alsola in the quarter-finals.

Stanford’s own No. 2 seed Connie Ma won the singles tournament with a win over No. 5 seed Alexandra Yepifanova in the finals, 6-4, 6-1.

Blake and Ma teamed up for the doubles tournament as the No. 1 seed, winning the bracket with a tie-breaker victory 9-7.

Notably absent for the ITA Northwest Regional was WSU’s Michaela Bayerlova. Bayerlova was missing from the Cougar Classic brackets in September as well. 

Ly-Nguyen had the best outing for the Cougs at the tournament, making it to the round of 16.