Wildcats win pair of regional titles

ACU men, women to return to national tournament

ABILENE -- The ACU men's and women's tennis teams held serve on their home court Friday, and as a result both will going to Altamonte Springs, Fla., next week for the NCAA Division II national championship tournament.

The ACU women, ranked No. 15 in the country, improved to 28-6 with a 5-0 whitewashing of Lone Star Conference rival Midwestern State to win the NCAA Division II Central Region championship at the Eager Tennis Center on the ACU campus.  The ACU men, ranked No. 25 in the country, improved to 26-5 with a hard-fought 5-4 decision over St. Edward's to win the men's regional title at the Eager Tennis Center.

Both ACU teams now advance to the national tournament, which will be played May 12-15 at the Seminole County Sanlando Park, and will be part of the first-ever NCAA Division II Spring Sports Festival.  The ACU women will be making their ninth straight appearance in the national tournament and their 17th overall since 1985, while the men are making their second straight appearance and eighth overall since 1990.

While the ACU women were cruising past the Lady Indians, the ACU men were having a much tougher time against the Hilltoppers of St. Edward's.  The Hilltoppers, in fact, took two of three doubles matches from the top-seeded Wildcats to grab a 2-1 lead going into singles play.  And that's where things got interesting.

St. Edward's won at No. 2 singles (Mario Quintero over Jason Ray) and No. 5 singles (Gustvao Ganem over Clayton Morgan) to grab a 4-1 lead. But ACU got the match tied with wins at No. 3 (Trent Broach over Simon Boyce), No. 4 (George Carstens over Jorge Jimenez) and No. 6 (Evan Puglia over Kenton Venhuizen), setting up the final dramatic match at No. 1 singles between ACU's Casper Steenkamp and Kendall Smashey from St. Edward's.

The two waged a classic battle that lasted nearly two hours and featured Smashey rallying from a 4-2 deficit in the first set to win 7-6 before Steenkamp won the second set 6-2.  That set up the all-important third set, which proved to be more endurance test than tennis match.  With the temperature hovering near 80 degrees and the humidity index somewhere around 75 percent, both players struggled to keep their bodies in the match.

But it was Smashey who broke down first.  Leading 3-2 he was assessed a game point for delay while trying to stretch out a cramp, helping Steenkamp get the set tied at 3-3.  Barely able to move because of cramps that were wracking both his legs, Smashey then lost the next game to fall behind 4-3 before his head coach, Russell Sterns, retired his own player to avoid further injury and giving the win to the Wildcats.

Smashey was attended to by the ACU athletic training staff before he was transported via ambulance to a local hospital to receive fluid treatment.

"We had that exact same thing happen to us in 1998 at the national tournament, so I know how those guys from St. Edward's feel right now," ACU head coach Hutton Jones said.  "Unfortunately it's part of the game of tennis, and Casper was able to endure the elements and the length of the match a little bit better, partly because of the work we do in the off-season."

The ACU women's match wasn't nearly as dramatic as the Wildcats did what has become old hat:  dominate in doubles and finish up the match quickly.  ACU won all three doubles match, and then watched Summer Beesley win at No. 2 singles and Rachel Taylor at No. 3 singles to win the match and the regional title.

The Wildcats have been dominating heading into the national tournament, having won their last eight matches by a combined score of 47-3, and all three of those losses came in a 4-3 win over NCAA Division I foe Texas State.  ACU's only loss in that stretch was a 4-3 loss late last month to Texas A&M, which was ranked No. 17 in the nation at the time.  ACU won all five of its matches at last month's LSC tournament by 5-0 scores, and won both its matches in the regional tournament by 5-0 scores.

"This is a special group of young women, and the exciting thing is that they're all underclassmen," Jones said.  "We've got a chance to do some great things with these girls."