Tag: Shiori Fukuda

Ohio State Women’s Tennis comes back to take down No. 2 Florida State

The 5th-ranked Ohio State Buckeyes upset the No. 2 Florida State Seminoles in Sunday’s nationally-televised match.

In a nationally-televised dual match against the No. 2 Florida State Seminoles, the Ohio State Buckeyes Women’s Tennis team came back from the brink of defeat to spring the upset.

The match, hosted at the USTA National Campus in Lake Nona, Florida (part of Orlando), was broadcast on Tennis Channel. Both teams made strong statements in a match that will have a positive impact on both programs, and college tennis in general.

The dual match was tense and tight from the start, with the doubles point coming down to a tiebreak on Court 2. Florida State’s Sasha Hill (remember that name) and Emmanuelle Salas ran away with it against Danielle Wolf and Isabelle Boulais, clinching that point for the Seminoles. If Ohio State wanted to spring the upset, the Buckeyes would need to win four singles matches.

Interestingly enough, Florida State only has one player nationally-ranked in singles at the moment. However, the Seminoles came into the match at 12-2 because they manage to find the right players at the right time to win matches. It looked like they would do the same against Ohio State, even though the Buckeyes have three nationally-ranked players.

All of the singles matches were pretty well-played, though five of the six had a clear superior player. Danielle Wolf, who just keeps getting better and better for the Buckeyes, beat Petra Hule in two quick sets. Top Buckeye Shiori Fukuda was challenged early, but quickly ran away with her match against Salas. Meanwhile, Florida State’s Victoria Allen and Nadnini Das won their singles matches in straight sets.

The unsung hero for Ohio State, though, is actually Luna Dormet. Dormet doesn’t always find her way into the starting lineup, and she actually had a losing record on the season coming into Sunday’s match. She found a way to beat Andrea Garcia in straight sets, though, setting the stage for one final singles match to determine the outcome.

Kolie Allen, who has not been as impressive this season as some had hoped, given her success last year, was on the brink of defeat against Sasha Hill. Hill served for the match (had four match points) in the second set, but Allen won four straight to break back. In the second-set tiebreak, Hill had a 5-2 lead. Allen came back again, winning five straight points to force a third and deciding set.

The third set, with Allen and Hill the only two players left on court, are what made this nationally-televised match a compelling classic. Allen saved break points serving at 1-2, then rattled off four straight games for a 5-2 lead. She failed to serve out the match twice, but broke again for 6-5. She finally held to serve out the set and the match, earning a Gatorade bath from her teammates in the process.

Not only is this is a great win for the Buckeyes, but it shows just how much upside this team has. Wolf seemingly has no limit. She just keeps on winning–on the same day that her brother won an ATP Challenger Tour title, Danielle possibly had the better day. Fukuda is one of the top singles players in the country. And between Allen and Irina Cantos Siemers, the Buckeyes have a lineup that cam beat just about anyone.

Ohio State, by far the class of the Big Ten, will play conference matchups for the rest of the year–aside from a quick trip to Baylor in early April. The Buckeyes have played the toughest schedule in the country so far, and currently sit at 8-3. The schedule gets far easier from here, which means that the Buckeyes should have a lot of momentum heading into the NCAA Tournament in May.

(Note: Those who watched the match on Tennis Channel may have noticed that the commentators said Ohio State was No. 10 in the country and Florida State was No. 6. The commentators referred to the USTA/Tennis Channel poll, while this article used the far more common ITA computer rankings.)

Ohio State Women’s Tennis dominates Purdue to open Big Ten play

Despite entering the week with a 6-3 record, the Ohio State Women’s Tennis team is actually No. 5 in the most recent ITA rankings. To understand this, recognize that the ITA rankings are entirely computer-based. Every player is given a score, based …

Despite entering the week with a 6-3 record, the Ohio State Women’s Tennis team is actually No. 5 in the most recent ITA rankings.

To understand this, recognize that the ITA rankings are entirely computer-based. Every player is given a score, based on the opponents defeated and lost to. It’s not meant to be a particularly predictive ranking. The ranking only tells us about the quality of opponents and how well the team performed against them.

Therefore, with wins over four teams in the Top 16 (and two more over teams in the Top 40), Ohio State’s rapid ranking rise is understandable. We can also understand why the three losses haven’t hurt the ranking too much, especially since all three are ranked in the Top 20.

This brings us to Thursday night, when the Buckeyes began Big Ten play against No. 46 Purdue. The Boilermakers are, shockingly, Ohio State’s worst opponent so far, and the Buckeyes took care of business. Ohio State easily won the doubles point with two 6-1 sets, and were leading 5-2 in the unfinished third set.

Unlike most matches, which end the dual match as soon as one team reaches four points, Ohio State and Purdue played out all six singles courts in full. If this had been a standard dual match, the Buckeyes would have won 4-0. Nationally-ranked Buckeyes Shiori Fukuda, Irina Cantos-Siemers, and Danielle Wolf each easily finished off their singles matches, clinching the victory for the Buckeyes.

Of the then-irrelevant singles matches, Purdue did win two of the final three, including a three-set victory by Nikol Dobrilova over formerly nationally-ranked Kolie Allen. Those losses on the later courts could be a bit concerning for the Buckeyes, as you can’t always rely on your top players to see you through. You need the ones at the bottom of the lineup too. Still, this was a strong victory for Ohio State, though there is definitely room to improve as the season goes on.

The Buckeyes dip back out of conference for a match against Florida State on Sunday (broadcast on Tennis Channel, which is great exposure for the programs in particular and college tennis in general). After that, it’s back to Big Ten play for the rest of the season (aside from one early-April trip to face Baylor). The Buckeyes looked to be the class of the Big Ten in early-season play. Let’s see if they sustain that through the conference season.

Ohio State Women’s Tennis Jumps from No. 25 to No. 12

After an impressive week with two ranked wins, including over No. 10 Oklahoma State, the Ohio State Women’s Tennis team jumped to No. 12.

The Ohio State Buckeyes have one of the stronger tennis programs in the country right now. That elusive National Championship hasn’t come yet, but the Buckeyes have been tantalizingly close in the past five years.

The men’s program, led by rising now-professional J.J. Wolf, were the No. 1 team for most of last year before losing in the “Elite Eight.” (I use the air quotes because officially the NCAA only uses terms like Sweet Sixteen, Elite Eight, and Final Four for the basketball tournaments.) Before that, the program reached the National Championship in 2018 and the “Final Four” in 2017, along with other strong results this decade.

What many fans might have missed, though, is that the women’s tennis program has also been very strong this decade. Led by Francesca Di Lorenzo, the 2017 women’s team also reached the “Final Four,” losing in an incredibly tight third-set tiebreak in the final match to Stanford.

It’s been a bit of a rough two years for the women’s program since then; they missed the NCAA tournament entirely in 2018, and lost a tight match in the first round last year.

This year, though, the program finally looks to be headed back to its previous heights. Led by Redshirt Junior Shiori Fukuda, this year’s Buckeye squad is full of strong players up and down the lineup. Two other Buckeyes are nationally ranked so far–Irina Cantos Siemers and Kolie Allen. Danielle Wolf, J.J.’s sister, has also been a strong player who has improved every year, and in her Redshirt Senior year she also looks like a national contender, having just dominated nationally ranked Ayumi Miyamoto in her most recent match (a 6-2 6-1 victory).

The Buckeyes opened the season with two wins at the ITA Kick-Off event in Stillwater, Oklahoma, knocking off No. 24 Wake Forest and No. 10 Oklahoma State in the process. Because of that, the Buckeyes jumped from their spot at No. 25 in the ITA rankings all the way to No. 12. The men, meanwhile, sit at No. 6, as they start the meat of their schedule next week.

It’s still early in the season, but Ohio State is well on its way to being a tennis powerhouse again–on both the men’s and women’s sides of the court.