Feb. 28, 2009

Box Score

ATHENS, Ga. - Yvette Hyndman rallied for a third-set win as second-ranked Georgia edged seventh-ranked Baylor 4-3 on Saturday at the Hopkins Indoor Tennis Center.

The loss is the third for the Lady Bears this season, with all three losses coming by a 4-3 margin.

Georgia took a 1-0 lead by winning a hard-fought doubles point over the Bears as rain forced the match indoors. The point came down to a tiebreaker in the No. 3 contest. The Bulldogs changed their doubles lineup for only the second time this season. At No. 1, Georgia freshmen Chelsey Gullickson and Nadja Gilchrist were paired together for the first time, and they dispatched Baylor's seventh-ranked duo of Lenka Broosova and Csilla Borsayni 8-2. At that point, Georgia trailed 5-4 at No. 2 and 6-4 at No. 3. The Bears No. 2 duo of Taylor Ormond and Jelena Stanivuk ended up winning 8-6 over Yvette Hyndman and Naoko Ueshima. At No. 3, Baylor's Nina Sercerbegovic and Kasia Siwosz built a 7-5 lead over Georgia's Monika Dancevic and Cameron Ellis. The Bulldog duo saved match points at 7-6 and eventually forced a tiebreaker. The Bears took the first point of the tiebreaker before the Bulldogs reeled off seven straight points for the clinching victory and a 1-0 advantage in the match.

In singles, Baylor won the first set in three of the four matches. The exception was at No. 1 where seventh-ranked Gullickson posted a 7-5, 6-1 win over 26th-ranked Ormond to put the Bulldogs ahead 2-0. The Bears notched their first team point when 75th-ranked Broosova defeated 44th-ranked Gilchrist 6-2, 6-3 at No. 3. At that point, Dancevic and Stanivuk had split sets at No. 4, Borsanyi was up a set over Hyndman at No. 2, and the final two matches took the court.

Stanivuk posted a 6-3, 1-6, 6-3 win over Dancevic to even the match at 2-2. Hyndman came back to split sets against Borsanyi while Ueshima notched the first set in her match and Ellis and Sercerbergovic were tied at 5-5 in the first set. Georgia went up 3-2 when Ueshima closed out Karolina Filipiak 6-3, 6-2. Sercebegovic tied the match at 3-3 when she closed out Ellis 7-5, 6-3.

Borsanyi held serve to make it 5-5 in what was now the deciding match. It was Hyndman's turn to hold serve, and she did to take a 6-5 edge. Then, Borsanyi served and won the first two points before Hyndman produced three winners for a match point. Down 40-30, Borsanyi's two serve attempts sailed long for a double fault as Hyndman clinched the 4-3 win for the Bulldogs.

"Georgia has a very good team and did a great job of taking advantage of the opportunities we gave them today," said head coach Joey Scrivano. "I can't wait for the day that our whole team to shows up to play. On the bright side, I like the way some of our younger players are developing. They are the back bone of our team right now."

Baylor returns to action on Sunday afternoon as the seventh-ranked Bears continue their road trip, facing fourth-ranked Georgia Tech at 12 noon.