Box Score

The Detroit women's tennis team is heading back to the Horizon League Championship match for the second straight year as the Titans surged past the second-seeded Cleveland State Vikings, 4-1, on Saturday afternoon.

“I am truly happy for our players and everything they have accomplished this year,” said head coach Sam Poole. “We came into today's match with the attitude that we didn't want to go home and we gave everything we could out there to win.”

The doubles point started the match and it was a battle to the very end. Senior Svetlana Flankova (Riga, Latvia/Riga Secondary 21) and sophomore Sophie Sjoberg-Sundstrom (Gothenburg, Sweden/Katrinelunds Gymnasiet) evened things up at one apiece after an 8-4 win at No. 2, leaving No. 3 doubles as the rubber match. Junior Erin Weldon (Kalamazoo, MI/Mattawan) and freshman Melanie Capuano (Grosse Pointe Farms, MI/Grosse Pointe South) staged an epic showdown against CSU's Sanda Bjelan and Mengdi Liu and the match would end up going into a tiebreaker after the Titans rallied from a 7-6 score. The duo would then stamp the crucial point with a 9-8 (3) victory.

“They never let anything get away from them and kept working and fighting and that really set us up,” remarked Poole.

The singles battle saw Detroit (10-11) win three of the four finished matches starting with the top spot as 2010 HL Newcomer of the Year and first team All-Horizon League selection Carolina Salas Espinosa (Monterrey, Mexico/Preparatoria No. 7) defeated Catrine Bjerrehus, 6-3, 4-6, 6-1.

Cleveland State (17-12) squared the singles by winning at No. 2, but Detroit put the Vikings on the brink of elimination as Flankova took No. 4, 6-3, 2-6, 6-4.

Detroit would get that final match in the third spot as Sjoberg-Sundstrom rebounded from dropping the first set 6-1, to earn a 6-1, 6-4 triumph in the next two over Charlotte Gibbons, a win that sent the Titans into the championship match.

“I tell these ladies everyday that, win or lose, as long as I get 100 percent out of them, than I can be happy with their effort,” said Poole. “We have grown together as a team since the start and we need to just keep working hard tomorrow.” 

The Titans reached the championship match for the second straight year, as well as just the second time in program history, after recovering from an 0-7 start to the season. Detroit began the year with three newcomers to starting line-up after last year's record breaking squad, who ended the year with 15 wins, saw four seniors graduate and three starters lost. The three starters were also the top three netters in singles that UDM had to replace as well as forming three new double tandems on the year.

“There was a foundation here and what we needed to do was keep working hard and improving every day,” added Poole.

Detroit will now face the tournament's No. 1 seed in UIC on Sunday at 12:30 p.m. The Flames have won the league 13 straight times, defeating UDM last season in the championship match, 4-1.

Check back with DetroitTitans.com to see if you can watch the championship match live on the Horizon League Network.