Women’s tennis picks up 4th sweep of season against San Diego with lineup changes
In her first singles match of the season, junior Taylor Johnson picked up a win in straight sets 6-2, 7-5, contributing to No. 3 UCLA women’s tennis’ sweep over San Diego. Johnson also won her doubles match, making her 3-0 in doubles play on the season. (Alex Driscoll/Daily Bruin staff)
Women's Tennis
| No. 3 UCLA | 7 |
| San Diego | 0 |
By Jon Christon
Feb. 14, 2021 9:41 a.m.
The Bruins picked up a win with a lineup shake-up.
No. 3 UCLA women’s tennis (5-1) defeated San Diego (1-1) on the road 7-0, marking the Bruins’ fourth sweep of the season. The win came without UCLA’s top doubles pair competing and marked debuts for multiple Bruins in different ways.
UCLA won every point obtainable, winning all six singles matches – all but one in straight sets – and all three doubles sets.
With junior Elysia Bolton out of the lineup today for rest, the nation’s top doubles team made up of graduate student Jada Hart and Bolton did not take the court. Instead, Hart teamed up with the Bruins’ top singles player in sophomore Abbey Forbes on court one, resulting in a 6-4 victory.
“It was neat to see (Hart and Forbes) both play together – (Hart) and (Forbes) are very close friends,” said coach Stella Sampras Webster. “They played a very competitive match. The team they played is a very good team. So they had to play well to get that set. And so it’s neat to see (Forbes) step up and play in that No. 1 position with Jada leading.”
Sophomore Sasha Vagramov and junior Taylor Johnson both made debuts this week as well, with Johnson making her first singles appearance of the season and Vagramov her first competition of any kind in 2021.
Both Vagramov and Johnson won their singles matches in straight sets, with the former winning 6-3, 6-3, and the latter 6-2, 7-5, on courts five and six, respectively. Johnson also took home a win in her doubles match with partner senior Abi Altick, bringing their record as a team up to 3-0 on the year, all on court three.
Johnson said she was excited to get on the court for singles play and that she carried over her momentum from doubles play.
“I was really excited to play today because it’s been so long,” Johnson said. “It’s super early in the season. So I was just really excited beforehand. I was feeling good coming in from our doubles match, so that obviously helps.”
Despite the doubles play success from her team, Sampras Webster said there’s still work to be done on that front.
“Our doubles needs to continue to improve,” Sampras Webster said. “We use every match to get better and our goal is always to be at our best in May. And so we take every match and we continue to get better and we try to get four points.”
San Diego marked the last out-of-conference opponent UCLA will face before matching up against Pac-12 opponents, though conference play doesn’t officially start until March.
Vagramov said her team treats both conference and nonconference opponents in the same way.
“Our team doesn’t see a conference match and a nonconference match any differently,” Vagramov said. “We’re just excited to play any matches and just get out there and work on what we need to work on.”
UCLA will match up against conference foe California on Saturday in a nonconference match at Hellman Tennis Complex.
