BOISE, Idaho — UNLV took the doubles point and three singles wins to end UNM’s season with a 4-0 loss in the quarterfinals of the Mountain West Tournament, hosted by Boise State University at the Appleton Tennis Center.
The 4-0 score is a little deceiving as UNM led in two other matches and was in a tie in the third.
UNLV, the No. 1 seed, took the doubles point with a pair of 6-2 wins at Nos. 1 and 3 doubles, moving the match to singles, where the Lobos would need four wins for the second straight game. UNLV went up 2-0 when Izumi Asano defeated Yue Lin “Polly” Chen 6-1, 6-1, and then it moved to 3-0 when Anna Bogoslavets defeated Bronte Murgett 6-1, 6-3.
While UNLV went up 3-0, UNM was staying in the match. Hsaing-Wen “Albie” Huang won her opening set 6-0, and Ruth Copas won hers 6-2. Danielle Quevedo was in a tight batter at No. 5 singles, eventually going deep into a tiebreaker, and Diana Wong was tied 5-5 in the first, meaning while down 4-0, the Lobos were certainly in the match.
However, it turned at No. 1, as Aiwen Zhu won the final two games to take her opening set 7-5, and then she zipped past Wong 6-0 in the second, clinching the match. Huang for UNM was up 6-2, 2-2 when the match ended, and Copas was barely ahead 6-2, 2-6 and up 40-30 in the opening game of the third.
Quevedo was tied 6-6, and it was 8-8 in a tiebreaker when the match ended.
Overall, UNM finished 10-11, a three-game improvement from the 2017 season, and the Lobos did it with just one junior (Copas), one sophomore (Wong) and seven freshmen.
NOTES: Murgett and Quevedo finished tied for the team lead in singles wins with 17 each, and Murgett’s 13 in the Spring led the team … Huang, Murgett and Rich all tied with 17 doubles wins … Murgett’s 34 combined wins were the most on the team.
Season Ends in 4-0 Defeat to UNLV in Quarterfinals
