Tuesday, May 15, 2001
Streaks over -- PENSACOLA, Fla. >> For the first time in 104 matches, the Brigham Young-Hawaii women did not walk off the tennis court as the winning team.
BYUH loses in
national tennis final
The 5-3 defeat to Lynn
From staff and wire reports
ends Seasiders' skeins
at 4 titles, 103 winsThe Seasiders saw their NCAA-record win streak come to an end yesterday, with a 5-3 loss to No. 2 Lynn University of Florida in the NCAA Division II championship match.
The top-ranked Seasiders had won the last two Division II national championships -- including last year over Lynn -- and an unprecedented 103 straight dual matches. It was the first time the BYUH women had tasted defeat since they began Division II play in the fall of 1998.
Also coming to an end was BYUH's streak of four consecutive national women's tennis titles. The Seasiders won NAIA titles in 1997 and 1998.
"(Lynn is) a good team and they deserved to win," said BYUH coach Dave Porter. "We just didn't come prepared to play and I take responsibility for us not being ready. Maybe we had won too many matches, too easily, for too long."
The Seasiders' last loss came during the 1998 regular season when they fell to Auburn-Montgomery, 5-4. BYUH rebounded to win the NAIA title.
"I expected it would have had to have been out of our division, against a very tough Division I team, or against the very best in our division in this exact situation," said Porter of the win streak coming to an end with the Division II title on the line. "But it's not about win streaks. ... Hopefully we'll learn from this and come back stronger from it."
The Seasiders blew a chance to take a 2-1 lead in doubles by failing on three match points and losing in No. 3 doubles, 9-7.
Lynn then took three of the first five singles matches for the determining 5-3 score.
Lynn's fifth point came when Monika Mastalirova defeated BYUH's Petra Gaspar in three sets in the No. 1 singles match.
The Seasiders finished at 36-1.
The No. 2 Seasider men (30-4) also ended their season yesterday, losing 5-4 to No. 1 Drury (Mo.) College in the third-place match.
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