There are mixed emotions for the Vandal women’s tennis team as it fell short of beating rival Boise State but dominated Eastern Washington Saturday in a double header.
Coach Daniel Pollock said Boise played how he expected — with a lot of energy, and a lot of noise.
“They got in our faces and basically did to us what I wanted to do to them which was to get off to an early, fast start and be really aggressive,” Pollock said. “They basically took it to us and our girls really needed to respond to that in the same manner and they just couldn’t do that.”
The Vandals lost the doubles point for the first time since the WSU match at the beginning of the season, going 1-2. Idaho couldn’t get its momentum back and dropped four of the six singles spots.
Idaho sophomore Sophie Vickers said the Vandals didn’t have their best day of tennis and the Broncos capitalized on it. Vickers was one of two singles winners and part of the only winning doubles team from Idaho, which she credits to playing with more confidence.
“I just played more aggressive tennis and committed to my shots and it seemed to pay off and I had a reasonably good day,” Vickers said.
Vickers’ single match ended in a 10-4 third set and said she met this same opponent in the fall, had the same type of grueling matchup, and barely pulled out the win so she knew it would be a tough match. The set was so long because it was a 10-point super tie-break where the first to ten points wins.
Idaho senior and team captain Molly Knox said the BSU match was close and full of great match ups, but the Vandals didn’t come out strong enough and losing the doubles point was a bad start. She said the packed house didn’t make it any easier.
“They had a lot of support on their home court and I think everyone went out and fought really hard but it just didn’t go how we wanted it to go,” Knox said. “We had a few supporters out there, but I think we were a little overwhelmed by all the Boise fans.”
Pollock said there was a lot of noise, screaming and shouting during the points, but it’s expected when these two teams meet.
“You can either relish it or it hurts you, and it hurt us yesterday,” Pollock said.
He said Idaho had an idea of the noise, but it is hard to know what to expect until a team actually plays in it. He said this experience will help the young team in the future.
Idaho got right back on the court to face another good team in Eastern Washington. The Vandals were in a similar situation earlier this season after their loss to Montana when they went on to beat Portland State 7-0.
The Vandals won 6-1 dropping just one singles match at the No. 5 spot. Pollock said he challenged the team to go out and get its pride back.
“There are a couple spots that we could have played better, but we got the job done and got the W. which saved our weekend a little bit, so that was good,” Pollock said.
Knox said most of the players did a good job coming out with energy and shutting down the Eagles and that the Boise loss may have had them fired up. She said the Eagles played great tennis though, making for some tough matches.
“Eastern looked better than we expected, they have a really strong team but just haven’t had a very good start to the season and everyone had to come out on top of their game a little harder after playing in the morning and being a little tired,” Knox said.
She said getting the victory was great for the morale of the team after losing a match that meant so much.
“We were pretty disappointed because we felt like this was a year we could definitely beat BSU but when things go wrong you just have to let it go and look to the future and win your next match and that’s what we did so we were pretty happy for the rest of the day,” Knox said.
Pollock said Boise deserved the win and he can’t compliment the Broncos enough on their level of play. He said Idaho’s ability to get back on the court and beat someone right away definitely made it easier to handle the loss and the weekend.
“It’s a shame we didn’t come out and give them everything we got, but overall I think it’s a fair result and definitely good to get a win at the end of all of it,” Pollock said.