STANFORD, Calif. — The Florida women's tennis team returns to the courts today when the Gators take on Miami in the quarterfinals of the NCAA Championships at Taube Tennis Stadium.
Today's match between the second-seeded Gators (28-1) and the seventh-seeded Hurricanes (21-6) is scheduled to begin at 3 p.m. ET.
Both teams were pushed in their respective NCAA Round of 16 match-ups, with Florida earning a deceiving 4-1 victory against Clemson and Miami taking the 4-2 win against Michigan.
“That was high-level tennis,” UF head coach Roland Thornqvist said of the Gator's hard-fought win. “Clemson played really well. They brought the best out of our players and sometimes you need a little adrenalin like that, a match where you have to dig down deep and we haven't had a match like that since February. All of our matches have been 4-1, 4-0 decisions in the last several weeks. At the end of the day, we did really well at the end of sets (Friday) and that means a lot.”
Florida, which sports a 20-4 all-time record in the NCAA quarterfinal round, enters this afternoon's match riding a 18-match winning streak.
The Gators lead the all-time series against the Hurricanes, 35-21, including the hard-fought 4-1 victory on Feb. 18 in the round of 16 at the ITA National Team Indoor Championships.
“It's going to be a knock-down, drag-out fight like it always is against them,” Thornqvist said. “They compete really hard. They are very talented. We played them at the National Team Indoors and had a few different lineups. I anticipate it being the typical Florida-Miami match. There are going to be many, many balls hit for hours and hours. We'll be ready for it. We talked about the earlier meeting with the team and I thought we played well in doubles in that match. We're going to have to play well again tomorrow. They have some players on their roster who will make a million balls so we have to have good legs and make wise decisions. We have to be ready to play long matches at certain spots.”
Today will the sixth meeting in the NCAA Championships between Florida and Miami, with the Gators holding a slim 3-2 advantage.
The teams met in last year's NCAA quarterfinal round, where Florida earned the 4-0 win. The previous postseason matchup was a 4-3 Miami stunner in the second round of the 2004 event, also the last time the Gators lost a home match.
