April 17, 1999
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - The Purdue women's tennis team suffered a 7-0 loss at the hands of No. 23 Northwestern at the Lafayette Sports Center today. The Boilermakers, who had won two Big Ten matches last weekend at Michigan and Michigan State, saw their conference record dip to 3-4, while their overall mark went to 7-12. The win by the Wildcats, meanwhile, avenged a 4-3 loss to Purdue in Evanston a year ago, and upped their record to 12-4 (6-1 Big Ten). This was Northwestern's fifth straight victory.
"We just got beat by a better team today," Purdue coach Mat Iandolo said. "There were definitely chances for us to make a run at them, but we never took advantage of those opportunities."
Despite strong play in doubles to start off the match, Purdue could not produce a win. Junior Jennifer Embry and Missy Wright, who make up the nation's 29th-ranked doubles team, took Northwestern's 27th-ranked Laura Guignon and Katherine Nasser to the brink before bowing 9-7. Purdue's sophomore pair of Erika Quebe and Lisa Walgenbach also pushed the limits before falling 9-7 to Jennifer Lutgert and Shannon Duffy 9-7 at No. 3.
Down a point heading into singles, the Boilermakers needed four victories to win the match. Unfortunately for Purdue, Northwestern carried its momentum from doubles into singles and swept all six matches in single sets. Quebe and Walgenbach had opportunities to stretch their matches to three sets, but lost second-set tiebreakers to Guignon and Lia Jackson, respectively.
Purdue gets a chance to even its Big Ten record tomorrow when it hosts Illinois at 11 a.m. at the Lafayette Sports Center. The Fighting Illini were 8-9 (3-3 Big Ten) heading into a match at Indiana today.
"I am very confident we'll be ready to come out tomorrow and take care of business against Illinois," Iandolo said."
Northwestern 7, Purdue 0
SINGLES
1. Katherine Nasser (NU) def. Jennifer Embry (PU) 6-2, 6-12. Laura Guignon (NU) def. Erika Quebe (PU) 6-3, 7-63. Shannon Duffy (NU) def. Shannon Taheny (PU) 6-2, 6-34. Colleen Cheng (NU) def. Missy Wright (PU) 6-0, 6-45. Lia Jackson (NU) def. Lisa Walgenbach (PU) 6-3, 7-66. Jennifer Lutgert (NU) def. Lynsey Fick (PU) 6-0, 6-0
DOUBLES
1. Guignon/Nasser (NU) def. Embry/Wright (PU) 9-72. Cheng/Jackson (NU) def. Taheny/Fick (PU) 8-53. Lutgert/Duffy (NU) def. Quebe/Walgenbach (PU) 9-7