Junior Alexandra Cercone was forced to battle, but she clinched the victory in both doubles and singles in No. 4 Florida’s 6-1 victory against No. 13 Clemson.
The Gators (5-1) started by winning and dropping a doubles match simultaneously. Danielle Collins and Olivia Janowicz dropped 8-4 to Clemson’s Beatrice Gumulya and Tirsten Dewar the same time that Lauren Embree and Sofie Oyen defeated Clemson’s Yana Koroleva and Romy Kolzer 8-4.
When both matches finished after 52 minutes, Cercone and Brianna Morgan were leading the Tigers’ Ani Miao and Liz Jeukeng 7-4 heading into Game 12. After three match-points for Florida, six game points for Clemson and 21 minutes, the Tigers moved to 7-5 in the set.
But Cercone and Morgan held strong and took the next game to defeat Miao and Jeukeng 8-5 and give the Gators an early 1-0 lead.
Coach Roland Thornqvist was still unpleased with Florida’s performance in doubles.
“We did not do a very good job body-language wise in doubles; somehow we won the doubles point anyway,” Thornqvist said. “That’s something we addressed in the locker room between doubles and singles. We have to do a much better job and have much more life to us in doubles.”
Cercone still had another battle ahead of her in singles.
After the first set got pushed to 6-6, Cercone took it in the tiebreak. In a match that lasted 2 hours and 2 minutes, the junior grabbed a 7-6 (4), 6-4 win over No. 57 Gumulya, the highest-ranked opponent Cercone has defeated this season.
“This is the most confidence I’ve ever had in Alex,” Thornqvist said. “Even in matches when she’s not striking the ball as well as she wants to, she still finds a way to put it where it needs to be and finds a way to close out sets. That tells you what kind of quality player and competitor she is.”
Prior to Cercone’s victory, Jeukeng defeated Oyen 6-2, 6-1 to give Clemson its first point. But freshmen Morgan and Collins defeated their opponents to bring the score to 3-1.
Although the match was decided, it wasn’t over.
There were two Gators left on the court after Cercone finished. But Janowicz and Embree the two were able defeat their opponents 6-2, 4-6, 6-2 and 6-1, 1-6, 7-6 (2), respectively.
“I thought we were spectacular in singles because Clemson is really, really talented,” Thornqvist said. “We had to use our head and play smart, play good defense in some spots. I was really proud of how we came out playing in singles because this is a really good Clemson team.”
Contact Katie Agostin at kagostin@alligator.org.
Alexandra Cercone returns a volley. Cercone propelled Florida to a 7-0 victory against South Carolina on Saturday.
