Williams grabs 100th career win, Pitt shuts out SFU

Senior tennis player Jill Williams won both of her matches Tuesday against St. Francis (Pa.),… Senior tennis player Jill Williams won both of her matches Tuesday against St. Francis (Pa.), but this time the first match was a little sweeter. Her first win entered her into Pitt’s 100-victory club. Pitt women’s tennis has been around since 1975, and in those 30 years only seven players have won 100 or more games as a Panther.

“It was a great accomplishment that we’ve been anticipating,” head coach George Dieffenbach said proudly. “So few people have been able to do that, to be one of those seven.”

The record for most combined singles and doubles wins is 116, held by Julie LoPrinzi, and was set between 1989 and 1993. With nine matches left and the Big East Championship, Williams could break the record.

Williams has been playing at No. 1 singles for four years, and her success in that slot continued in the matches she played Tuesday at St. Francis. At No. 1 doubles, Williams paired up with Emily Hughes to roll over Lesley Wenzel and Roxy Ionescu of the Red Flash, for a powerful 8-1 victory. Williams met Wenzel again in No. 1 singles, and improved her overall record to 101 combined wins with a 6-1, 6-1 victory.

The rest of the Panthers (5-6 overall, 0-1 Big East), sweeping St. Francis 7-0 for the match.

At No. 2 doubles, Pitt’s Becky Emmers and Annie Davies shut out Becky Seybold and Danielle Gauthier, 8-0. Emmers and Davies now have a winning streak of eight matches.

Panthers Leah Friedman and Carlie Smith wrapped up the doubles play with anothervictory that came against Mallary Palmer and Lauren Gamerro, that ended with a score of 8-0.

In singles play, Emmers won her third straight match in a super-tiebreaker against Ionescu, with a score of 6-0, 4-6 (10-5) at the No. 2 spot. Davies recorded her 11th win of the season, sweeping Seybold in No. 3 singles, 6-0, 6-0.

The No. 4 singles match was won for the Panthers in typical Friedman fashion. The freshman upped her record to 13-7 with her 6-0, 6-0 win against Palmer. Hughes is still leading the team at singles, sitting at 14-5 record for the season. That 14th win came at the No. 4 spot, defeating Gamerro 6-0, 6-1.

After a win by default against St. Bonaventure, Smith came back to prove that she can still get the win the old-fashioned way. The Pitt freshman swept the No. 6 singles against Johnna Jackson, 6-0, 6-0, and put the final touch on the 7-0 Panther victory over the Red Flash.

“This match got them ready for [Wednesday’s match]. It gave them confidence going into a difficult match that we need to win,” said Dieffenbach.

Dieffenbach named two things as their main goals of the season: ending with a winning record and making the Big East Championship. The Panthers have one last game against a non-conference opponent, Carnegie Mellon on March 30, before they get back into their Big East schedule, with a game on April 1 against Seton Hall.

Dieffenbach is sure his team is ready for every future matchup if the players continue to keep focused on the most important thing.

“The team knows what they have to do to win tomorrow,” he said. “[They’ll need to] focus on getting the doubles point. They have to play very aggressively, combine that with consistency, and use the confidence they got from today’s win.”