April 30, 2008
LAS VEGAS - For the third time in her illustrious career, UNLV tennis star Elena Gantcheva has earned a bid to the NCAA Division I Singles Championship as the 64-woman field was announced Wednesday afternoon. In addition, she and partner Kristina Nedeltcheva were listed as the first alternate for the 32-team doubles tournament.
A senior from Sofia, Bulgaria, Gantcheva also learned that she had extended her school and conference record by being named Mountain West Conference Player of the Week for a ninth and final time.
Gantcheva, who is ranked 36th in the nation, is riding a nine-match winning streak and boasts a 30-10 overall mark. The three-time Mountain West Conference Player of the Year earned her UNLV-single-season-record-tying fourth player of the week honor this spring after leading the Lady Rebels to their first league tournament title in six years over the weekend.
Gantcheva finished a combined 4-0 in Forth Worth, Texas, including running her doubles winning streak to 10 matches with Nedeltcheva. In singles, Gantcheva clinched the crown for UNLV on Saturday by sweeping No. 61 Nina Munch-Soegard on the Horned Frogs' home courts.
While she and Nedeltcheva won their way into the Round of 16 in last year's NCAA doubles event, Gantcheva will be looking for her first career NCAA singles victory when she opens plays at the Case Tennis Center in Tulsa, Okla., on May 21. She was forced to withdraw from the 2005 tournament because of injury, was defeated in the first round of the 2006 event and did not make the field as a junior.
Gantcheva, who earned the MWC's automatic bid into the singles field, is only the second UNLV woman to play in multiple NCAA singles tournaments and her combined total of four career bids trails only Marianne Vallin's eight singles and doubles appearances from 1994-97.
Gantcheva will attempt to become first Lady Rebel to advance at the singles event since Katarina Malec rolled into the 2000 final four before falling the semifinals to the eventual national champion.
The singles and doubles tournaments begin the day after the NCAA team champion is crowned. UNLV opens play with a first-round matchup with Pepperdine in Los Angeles on May 9.
