The Notre Dame tennis teams finished their respective regular seasons over the weekend, gearing up for the upcoming ACC Tournament. The Irish men’s team swept Boston College on the road to finish 13-13 overall and 4-8 in ACC play, while the women split at home with Duke and North Carolina to end the season at 16-8 overall and 7-6 in the conference.
Irish men ground Eagles in lopsided sweep
Notre Dame’s second consecutive sweep win left minimal doubt on Friday at Boston College. The Irish ended their regular season with a 7-0 takedown that followed a Wednesday blanking of Louisville at home. With the road win, Notre Dame returned to .500 with an overall record of 13-13 and a conference mark of 4-8.
Notre Dame opened the match by taking every set played in doubles action. No. 2 doubles wrapped up first, with graduate student Nil Giraldez and freshman Chase Thompson rolling to a 6-0 win. Soon after, the 12th-ranked combination of sophomore Sebastian Dominko and senior Jean-Marc Malkowski closed out No. 1 doubles with a 6-3 win. They did so against another top-20 doubles team, 18th-ranked Juan Jose Bianchi and Jake Vassel of Boston College. Sophomore Evan Lee and junior Yu Zhang earned a 6-1 win in No. 3 doubles, closing out a successful start to the day.
In singles play, Notre Dame and Boston College finished out all six matches, all of which belonged to the Irish. The No. 1 matchup wrapped up first, with the 39th-ranked Dominko handling Bianchi in two sets (6-2, 6-4). Wins from Zhang and junior Brian Bilsey in No. 5 and 6 singles then helped Notre Dame reach the day’s clinching point.
With the overall match in hand, Notre Dame claimed three more victories in singles, including two-set wins from Thompson and junior Jameson Corsillo. Only in No. 2 singles did Boston College offer significant pushback. There, Giraldez and Mai Gao split their first two sets before Giraldez claimed a 1-0 (10-2) third-set triumph that finalized Notre Dame’s shutout.
Irish women split challenging weekend at home
On the women’s side, Notre Dame started its final weekend of the regular season with a major win at home. The Irish, previously 0-6 against top-25 opponents, overcame No. 21 Duke on home court for a 4-2 win. The takedown marked Notre Dame’s fourth consecutive victory, three of which have come against ACC teams ranked inside the top 60 nationally.
In what lined up as a competitive match between the 21st-ranked Blue Devils and the 32nd-ranked Irish, Duke made the day’s first move. Its No. 2 doubles team of Emma Jackson and Shavit Kimchi downed junior Carrie Beckman and sophomore Akari Matsuno by a 6-1 score.
But Notre Dame, with its back against the wall, swung right back. Senior Yashna Yellayi and junior Nibi Ghosh earned a 6-4 win in No. 3 doubles, setting the fate of the doubles point on the No. 1 matchup. There, graduate student Page Freeman and senior Julia Andreach edged out Duke’s top team by a 7-6 (7-5) score, putting the Irish ahead 1-0.
Singles play opened with both teams taking a two-set victory. Duke briefly leveled the score with a 6-3, 6-3 win in No. 6 singles, but Notre Dame regained the lead with a defeat by the same count in No. 5 singles. The Irish then went ahead 3-1 on a 6-4, 7-6 (7-1) victory from sophomore Bojana Pozder in the No. 3 matchup.
Though Duke pulled back within a point with a tiebreaker victory in No. 2 singles, Notre Dame slammed the door shut in a top-100 matchup in No. 1 singles. Andreach, the 28th-ranked singles player in the country, took a pair of 7-5 set victories from the 87th-ranked Jackson, sealing the 4-2 Irish win.
On Sunday, Notre Dame dealt with an even tougher adversary in a top-five North Carolina team. The Tar Heels got the better of the Irish in the regular-season finale, winning 5-2 at Eck Tennis Pavilion.
Each of North Carolina’s top two doubles teams rank inside the top 50 nationally, and they showed the Irish why on Sunday. The 13th-ranked combination of Fiona Crawley and Carson Tanguilig triumphed 6-1 in No. 1 doubled, while the 47th-ranked duo of Elizabeth Scotty and Anika Yarlagadda won 6-2.
With the doubled point in hand, the Tar Heels secured additional points in No. 1, No. 3, No. 4 and No. 7 singles. Given that all six active North Carolina singles players rank inside the top 70 nationally, Notre Dame impressed just by taking two points. Yellayi claimed one against the 27th-ranked Yarlagadda by winning 6-4, 7-6 (7-5), and Freeman earned the other with a 6-3, 3-6, 4-0, retired defeat of the 34th-ranked Scotty.
The women’s team will begin its ACC Tournament on Tuesday, while the men will start postseason play on Wednesday in Cary, North Carolina.
