Strong showing made by Lopes at ITA Regionals

Thursday, October 20

Malibu, Calif.

Grand Canyon

ITA Southwest Regional

10/24/2022 5:09:00 PM | Men's Tennis, Women's Tennis

Women's ITA Results Men's ITA Results

Puehse, Strombacha advance to Round of 16 in doubles

By: Jerob Moon

Both Grand Canyon tennis teams had a strong showing at the ITA Southwest Regional over the weekend.

The GCU women were headlined by senior Natasha Puehse and junior Santa Strombacha, who advanced to the quarterfinals of the main doubles draw and combined for six singles wins.

The men had a trio of Lopes advance to the second round in the 128-player draw in singles, while junior Adrien Coulome and freshman Paolo Rosati made a run in doubles to the round of 32.

Women

In San Diego, the women had a strong showing in doubles. Puehse and Strombacha were the headliners, becoming just the third GCU duo to advance to the quarterfinals of the main draw and the first since 2016. The GCU No. 1 duo from last season defeated Hawaii's Ana Vilcek and Satsuki Takamura 8-4 and San Diego's Victoria Kalaitzis and Jordyn McBride 8-7 (7-5) in the first two rounds. In the quarterfinals, the Lopes fell 8-1 to Pepperdine's No. 1 seed.

In singles, GCU was strong with six wins. A trio of Lopes — Puehse and freshmen Anali Kocevar and Dania Deaifi — all won their first-round matches. In the second round, Puehse fell in three sets to Paticija Spaka from Arizona State while Kocevar had a long battle against UCLA's Kimmi Hance in three sets.

In the extra singles matches, graduate transfer Madeline Lamoreaux picked up a pair of straight set wins while Strombacha defeated Rachel Wagner from UC San Diego 6-1, 6-2.

Men

The men competed at Pepperdine and picked up three singles wins in the main draw. GCU junior Stanislas De Samucewicz won 3-6, 6-3, 6-3 over Hawaii's Cody Castro while sophomore Jonathan Da Silva won in straight sets over UC San Diego's Eric Silberman. Coulome had to battle in three sets over UCSD's Charles Qian, eventually winning 7-6, 5-7, 7-5.

In doubles, Coulome and Rosati advanced to the second round with a 8-7 (7-5) win over UC Irvine's Rithvik Krishna and Lawee Sherif. In the second round, the GCU duo lost an 8-4 match against San Diego's Iiro Vasa and Sacchitt Sharrma.

This concludes the men's fall season while the women have one more event in Tucson at the Wildcat Invitational from Oct. 28-30.