5/20/2000 12:00:00 AM | Women's Tennis
May 20, 2000
MALIBU, Calif. - UNLV senior Katarina Malec and doubles partner Marianne Bakken will have the advantage of playing lower ranked opponents in Monday's first round of the NCAA singles and doubles championships.
The draws for both tournaments, which run through May 26 on the campus of Pepperdine University, were released Saturday.
Malec (35-5), ranked 29th, will take on 49th-ranked senior Veronika Safarova of Southern California in the 64-player field.
Only the third Lady Rebel to earn a spot in the national singles tournament, Malec has won 15 straight matches and is two away from tying Marianne Vallin's 1994 school record for single-season victories.
Monday's survivor will face the winner of a match between California's 14th-ranked Amy Jensen and Clemson's 26th-ranked Carmina Giraldo.
In the 32-team doubles bracket, Malec and Bakken (24-3) look to become the first UNLV doubles team to win even a single match at the NCAA event -- and will attempt it against a familiar foe.
The winners of 14 straight, 27th-ranked Malec and Bakken are scheduled to face 46th-ranked Ashleigh Dolman and Maria Galoustova of Oklahoma State for the third time this season.
Malec and Bakken lost to Dolman and Galoustova, 8-5, at the UNLV Fall Invitational on October 1 but the Lady Rebel duo downed the Cowgirl pair 8-3 on March 14 as part of a dual match played in Las Vegas.
Monday's winner will take on the winner of fifth-ranked Claire Curran and Jensen of California vs. ninth-ranked Sarah Walker and Amanda Basica of UCLA.
2000 UNLV NCAA WOMEN'S TENNIS NOTES
-- Katarina Malec is only the second player in school history to qualify for both an NCAA singles and doubles tournament during her career. Three-time All-American Marianne Vallin was the first with four singles bids and three doubles appearances.
-- Malec heads into the NCAA tournament with a 13-2 record vs. ranked opponents. Malec's 35 victories overall are the second-most single-season wins in UNLV history. She needs two more to tie the school record of 37 set by Vallin in 1994. Malec also has the highest single-season (.875) and career winning percentage (.808) in UNLV history.
-- Malec has won 29 consecutive matches in singles (15) and doubles (14) combined. The last time the native of Warsaw, Poland, lost was February 25th when she fell in singles to now-top-ranked Marissa Irvin of Stanford 6-4, 6-1, and in doubles with partner Marianne Bakken to the NCAA tournament's top seed, Irvin and Teryn Ashley.
-- Malec, a four-time conference player of the week this spring, became the third UNLV woman to be named her league's MVP when she was tabbed Mountain West Player of the Year. Vallin won the award thrice (1994, '96, '97) and Jolene Watanabe once (1990).
-- No UNLV woman has ever won more than one match in singles at the NCAA tournament and even one doubles match at the national event.
-- Malec and Bakken helped lead their team to the school's first-ever league title as the Lady Rebels won the inaugural Mountain West Conference championship with a 5-2 upset of BYU on April 29.
-- Malec and Bakken recorded their biggest win of the year when the duo upset the nation's top-ranked doubles team - Zuzana Lesenarova and Katarina Valkyova of San Diego on April 2. The 9-8 tie-breaker victory sealed a 5-4 dual-match upset of the Toreros and turned around the Lady Rebels' season as UNLV won its final five matches.
-- UNLV Head Coach Kevin Cory is in his first year leading the Lady Rebels but the 2000 Mountain West Conference Coach of the Year has plenty of NCAA championship experience after serving as assistant coach at perennial power Mississippi from 1996-99.
UNLV NCAA WOMEN'S TENNIS CHAMPIONSHIPS HISTORYSingles Qualifiers Year Total RecordKatarina Malec 2000 TBDMarianne Vallin 1994, '95, '96, '97 2-4Jolene Watanabe 1990 1-1
Doubles QualifiersMalec/Marianne Bakken 2000 TBDGee Gee Garvin/Susie Kocsis 1998 0-1Vallin/Garvin 1997 0-1Vallin/Astrid Copano 1995 0-1Vallin/Rachel Clark 1994 0-1
