The Bradley tennis team lost to Wisconsin and NIU last weekend, though freshman Kirstin Hailey recorded her first first singles point and sophomore duo Bozana Lojpur and Nikki Perlwitz pulled off another doubles win.
The woes continued as Bradley fell to Big Ten program Wisconsin 7-0 and to NIU 4-1 on Jan. 29. However, sophomore Juliana Martinez was able to win her first singles set against Wisconsin’s Nastasya Semenovski at No. 5 singles.
As the team continues to shake the rust off from the break, head coach Matt Tyler remains optimistic.
“I’m always positive about the team,” Tyler said. “[With] Wisconsin being a Big 10 team, we knew that was going to be a tough match for us. Against Northern Illinois, I knew they were going to be a good team, certainly a team I felt that we could beat, but we weren’t quite there yet.”
As the Badgers continued their dominance over Bradley, the Huskies won their first match against the Braves since 2017.
Hailey earned her first career dual victory against NIU at No. 2 singles. It was not an easy victory, as Hailey had to come back from being down a set, starting her match with 1-6, 6-2 and finishing 6-2 to claim the point.
“We have really high expectations for her,” Tyler said. “As high as she is in the lineup, playing [No. 2 singles] and [No. 1 singles] against Wisconsin, she’s going to be an outstanding player for us for the next four years.”
The Wisconsin showdown marked the third time that the Braves have played shorthanded this season, as senior Bozana Lojpur was dealing with a minor injury.
‘’She had a bit of a knee injury going in,” Tyler said. “[It] hurt a little bit on Friday at practice and then she was questionable on Saturday, so we didn’t want to push her too much and have her play both matches.”
Lojpur did play against NIU along with her doubles partner, junior Nikki Perlwitz, as they picked up their 31st doubles win. While it was not enough to win the doubles point for the Braves, it pushed them closer to the fifth place of career wins for doubles teams.
Lojpur and Perlwitz have developed great chemistry on the court, and according to Perlwitz, the story is no different off the court.
“We’ve been playing doubles since our freshman year, so it’s definitely easier when you know what she’s [Lojpur] thinking during a point, because she knows what I want to do, and I know what she wants to do, and you kind of just move in sync when you’ve been playing together for that long,” Perlwitz said.
The Braves are set to face Chicago State on Feb. 5 and will face future MVC rival UIC on Feb. 6. Tyler remains positive going into this week’s action.
“We have a great record against Chicago State,” Tyler said. “I’m hoping we can pull out a win there; UIC has always been a tough team. Right now, things are looking good and everybody seems healthy, so I’m excited for the weekend.”
