Flushing, N.Y. - The Queens College women's tennis team upset the favorite, and local rival, Concordia on Sunday, to advance to the NCAA Round of 16 in Suprise, Arizona. The team was ranked 29th in the nation and 3rd in the East, while the Clippers entered the game at #20 overall and #2 in the region.
The match, which lasted over five hours, began with QC taking two of three points in doubles play. Concordia won at #1 doubles and Queens evened the score at 1-1 with Andrea Samson and Jenna Plevako winning 8-3 at #2. In the final match, that took two hours to complete, Queens held a 7-4 lead with Aylin Mehter and Cami Abdallah playing sensational doubles. Concordia came back and tied the score at 7-7, but Mehter and Abdallah refocused their concentration and went on to win the match at 9-7. This left the score 2-1 in favor of Queens heading into singles play.
In singles play, Romana Tabak, the #5 player in the country, beat Jenna Plevako, the #32 player in the country, 3-6, 2-6. Sumeera Kamil went up 5-2 in the 1st set against the #25 player in the country, but ended up losing 5-7,2-6. At this point Concordia was up 3-2.
Angelika Sobiecka played inspired tennis and beat Stephanie Canals 6-2,6-1 leaving the overall score at 3-3. After that, Cami Abdallah took the court to play Valerie Cheban and overpowered her, 6-1, 6-3, putting QC up, 4-3. Aylin Mehter won 6-1 in the 3rd set to clinch the victory for Queens at 5-3. Queens finished its record at 17-4 overall and 16-2 in D2 play.
With this victory, Queens makes it the the final 16 in the country for the fifth time in six years. This year's National NCAA Tournament Finals will be held in Surprise, Arizona from May 13 – May 16.
