May 9, 2008

LOS ANGELES - The seventh-seeded UCLA women's tennis team cruised in its opening match at the NCAA Tennis Championships on Friday, defeating Buffalo, 4-0 in regional play at the Los Angeles Tennis Center. The Bruins (19-5) will face Denver (23-2) in Saturday's second round at 3:00 p.m., with the winner advancing to next week's round of 16 in Tulsa, Okla. The Pioneers defeated Long Beach State, 4-0 in their first-round encounter on Friday morning.

UCLA picked up the doubles point with a pair of convincing wins at court Nos. 1 and 3. After Alex McGoodwin and Yasmin Schnack took care of business with an 8-1 decision at court No. 3, top-ranked Tracy Lin and Riza Zalameda clinched the point with an 8-2 victory over Buffalo's Denise Harijanto/Diana Popescu. It marked the 19th time in 24 matches this season that the Bruins have won the point.

UCLA continued to dominate Buffalo (12-9) in singles, quickly taking three straight wins to clinch the victory. First to finish was senior Elizabeth Lumpkin at court No. 5, as she didn't drop a game en route to a 6-0, 6-0 win over Diana Toia. That win was followed by a 6-0, 6-1 decision by Lin at court No. 2.

Freshman Andrea Remynse clinched the win for the Bruins in her first-ever NCAA match, taking a 6-0, 6-1 victory over Smaranda Stan at court No. 4.

Schnack and McGoodwin were both leading comfortably in their matches when play was suspended. McGoodwin was actually at match point, up 6-1, 5-1 over Tina Jacob at court No. 6. Zalameda had lost the first set against Andreea Novaceanu at court No. 1, but was leading 4-0 in the second.

Doubles

Singles