2007 CCIW Women’s Tennis Championship Preview

NAPERVILLE, Ill. – Wheaton and Carthage have combined to win the last nine College Conference of Illinois & Wisconsin (CCIW) Women’s Tennis Championships, dating back to 1998.

Both the Thunder and Lady Reds battled it out last April on the campus of Illinois Wesleyan as the CCIW hosted its first Women’s Tennis Automatic Qualifier Tournament. Carthage topped Wheaton 5-4 to earn the conference’s automatic bid to the NCAA Championship, six months after Wheaton had edged Carthage by three points to win the conference championship.

The two teams return to action with Augustana, Elmhurst, Illinois Wesleyan, Millikin and North Central for the 2007 CCIW Women’s Tennis Championship held Oct. 5-6 at Evergreen Racquet Club in Bloomington, Ill.

Two-time defending champion Wheaton is coming off a pair of 9-0 wins against conference foes Augustana and North Central on Sept. 29. Defending No. 1 singles champion Jordan Hook earned 6-0, 6-0 victories over Augustana’s Tricia Crawford and North Central’s Alicia Degrado. Reigning CCIW Women’s Tennis Player of the Week Brooke Parrish won at No. 3 singles and No. 2 doubles against the Vikings and Cardinals.

Carthage is also coming off a 9-0 victory against a CCIW opponent. The Lady Reds topped Elmhurst behind a pair of dominating straight-set victories. Beth Kaufman defeated Elmhurst’s Margie Leahu 6-0, 6-0 at No. 2 singles, while Taylor Gustafson won 6-0, 6-0 at No. 3 singles over the Bluejays’ Sabrina Ruff. Gustafson also teamed up with No. 1 singles player Gina Klein at No. 1 doubles, winning 8-1 over Emily Odean and Donna McKinney.

Illinois Wesleyan introduced new head coach Krista Cardona in 2007. Cardona is a full-time admissions counselor at Illinois Wesleyan and is also a former Titan tennis player. Under former coach Scott McCluskey, Illinois Wesleyan achieved a third place finish at last season’s championship. Cardona and company will look to build on that success at this year’s championship. The Titans recently earned a 5-4 win over North Central on Sept 23. The team had singles wins from Allison Heim at No. 1, Sarah Rusch at No. 2, and Kate Meyer at No. 6. Illinois Wesleyan had doubles wins from the No. 1 team of Heim and Rusch and the No. 2 team of Sarah Wilson and Cate Hunter.

Second-year Augustana head coach Adam Strand led his team to an 8-6 record (4-2 in the CCIW) in 2007 as the team earned a 6-3 win over North Central on Sept. 29 to close out the fall regular season. The Vikings won five of six singles matches, including Crawford’s 6-4, 6-3 win over Alicia DeGrado at No. 1 singles. Additionally, Tricia Sapio had a 6-1, 6-1 win at No. 6 singles over North Central’s Dominique Yonker.

North Central’s Missy Lewis earned the victory at No. 3 singles against Augustana, winning 7-6 (3), 7-6 (1) over Emily Doemland. The Cardinals also won a pair of doubles matches as Lewis teamed up with Allison Paschold to win 9-7 over Crawford and Doemland at No. 1 doubles. North Central won the No. 2 doubles match as Alicia DeGrado and Kelly Hatch defeated Jenna Richardson and Kaitlin Kulovitz 8-2.

Like Illinois Wesleyan, Elmhurst also introduced a new coach in Tethnie Forbes. The Bluejays finished the fall at 4-8, but recently defeated non-conference foe Benedictine 8-1 on Sept. 20. Elmhurst’s Alex Stark won in straight sets at No. 5 singles over Maniza Azam of Benedictine 6-0, 6-0. Elmhurst’s Lauren Hennessey earned CCIW Women’s Tennis Player of the Week honors on Sept. 18. She teamed up with Kristin Leninger to win at No. 3 doubles against Millikin (8-5) that week. She also won at No. 6 singles (6-0, 6-0) and No. 3 doubles (8-2) against Illinois Wesleyan.

New Millikin head coach Marc Smith and company picked up its first win of the season with a 7-2 victory over non-conference opponent Illinois College on Oct. 1. Earlier in the year, Kristen Sproat won her No. 3 singles match against Elmhurst, while Rhoda Lewis won at No. 6 singles against the Bluejays.