The Ohio State Women’s Tennis team huddles up before the Ohio State-Michigan match on Feb. 28. Ohio State lost 3-4. Credit: Christian Harsa | Special Projects Director
Conventional wisdom says a team wants to be its hottest of the season when entering postseason play.
Ohio State’s women’s tennis team is just that right now.
The Buckeyes (21-3, 15-1) enter their NCAA Tournament First Round matchup against University of Illinois at Chicago (19-5, 9-1) as the No.15 seed on a 12-match winning streak, including a clean three-match sweep of the Big Ten Tournament. Head coach Melissa Schaub said after last season’s cancellation, her team is excited to take the court in the NCAA Tournament.
“The locker room is probably at a high right now in the season,” Schaub said. “I think everything that we’ve been able to accomplish this year and get through, I think it’s made it that much sweeter just with knowing what happened last year.”
The last Ohio State loss came in Columbus against Michigan Feb. 28, but since then, it rattled off nine wins in a row to earn the Big Ten regular season title.
The Buckeyes then went to Madison, Wisconsin, for the Big Ten Tournament and dominated, beating Michigan State 4-0 in the quarterfinals and Iowa 4-2 in the semifinals before getting revenge on the Wolverines 4-1 in the finals.
Ohio State’s singles attack this season has been led by Intercollegiate Tennis Association’s No. 18-ranked Irina Cantos Siemers who is 18-5 on the year with most of her work done against the opposing teams’ No. 1 competitors.
The sophomore from Barcelona, Spain, has matured quickly from mainly playing as the Buckeyes’ No. 5 last season. Now, the lefty boasts a 10-5 record against opposing No. 1’s and 5-0 against No. 2’s en route to a unanimous all-Big Ten selection.
The Buckeyes have also received a lift in their singles matches from senior Luna Dormet. She has amassed a 20-1 singles record this season, and Schaub said she doesn’t get enough credit for her talent.
“Luna Dormet is a kid that doesn’t get as much attention as she deserves,” Schaub said. “She’s just been unbelievable for us the past couple of seasons and tough kid, and just loves everything about what it means to be a Buckeye and those are the type of kids that you want to coach and you want to lean on as much as you can.”
Rounding out Ohio State’s premier singles team are redshirt sophomore Lucia Marzal, Big Ten Tournament MVP and graduate Lisa Hofbauer and all-Big Ten junior Isabelle Boulais.
Marzal has excelled, compiling a 22-3 record while Hofbauer and Boulais have held their own at 14-8 and 11-5, respectively.
The Buckeyes also dominate in doubles play with an overall record of 49-19.
There was a three-match stretch Feb. 5-7 in which Ohio State did not take the doubles point, but it has claimed it in 19-consecutive contests since.
It’s headlined by junior Kolie Allen and Boulais, whose 14-2 record against opposing teams’ best duos led to their ITA No. 52 doubles ranking.
The combination has won 12 of their last 19 matches together, with only six matches going unfinished. In their last four matches, opponents have not won more than three sets.
Both of their losses this season came against partners who are now nationally ranked — Georgia Tech’s ITA No. 3 pair of seniors Victoria Flores and Kenya Jones and Michigan’s No. 56 duo of freshman Jaedan Brown and graduate Chiara Lommer.
The other two Buckeyes doubles couples consist of Hofbauer/Marzal who have collected an 11-2 record against opposing No. 2’s and Dormet/Cantos Siemers who are undefeated this season — 11 of their 12 total wins have come against No. 3 competition.
Schaub led the team to its seventh-consecutive NCAA Tournament in her ninth season at the helm, as last year’s postseason play was canceled due to COVID-19.
The Buckeyes have never won a national championship. Their best postseason finish came in 2017 when they advanced to the NCAA Tournament semifinals.
Schaub, who won her fourth Big Ten Coach of the Year award Monday, said the way her team avoids a first-round exit, like its last two tournament appearances in 2018-19, is by playing one match at a time and focusing on the opponent at hand.
“We respect every opponent equally, we know we need to be ready for everyone, especially in the NCAA Tournament where people are playing with you-lose-and-you-go-home mentality and people’s careers are ending and there’s that much more on the line,” Schaub said. “I think we have a group that, you know, they have high goals and then hopefully we’ll be ready.”
Ohio State’s first round matchup against UIC starts at 2 p.m. Friday and, if it wins, it will play the winner of Ball State-Vanderbilt Saturday at noon at the Auer Tennis Complex in Columbus.The full 64-team women’s tennis NCAA Tournament bracket is available here.
