St. John's University Athletics
2005 Women's Tennis Spring Season Review
2/23/2006 12:00:00 AM | Women's Tennis
The St. John's women's tennis team had one goal in mind entering the 2005 spring season -- to make the BIG EAST tournament. Not only did the Red Storm accomplish its goal, the women earned third place. With a 13-4 overall finish and an 8-1 mark against conference teams, the Red Storm had an impressive season on the courts.
Despite a 1-4 start to the season, the team stormed back to produce an eight-match winning streak before entering the conference tournament. Falling 4-3 in its first three matches to Syracuse (Feb. 4), UMass (Feb. 5) and Army (Feb. 12), the Red Storm went on to pick up a 6-1 win over Georgetown at Alley Pond Park on Feb. 19 and a 4-3 win over Seton Hall on March 19.
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| Barbora Blahutiakova |
At Crocheron Park in Bayside, N.Y., the Red Storm produced a 6-1 victory over Pittsburgh (April 10) and a 7-0 sweep of Rutgers (April 15). St. John's ended the regular season with road victories at Providence (7-0) on April 16 and Villanova (7-0) on April 19.
At the conference tournament, the Red Storm successfully advanced to the semifinals with a 4-1 performance against West Virginia. Meanwhile, Notre Dame was a challenge for St. John's as the Fighting Irish topped the Red Storm 4-0. However, St. John's returned on April 23 to sweep Boston College 4-0 and took third place. Kristina Bothova and Barbora Blahutiakova produced an 8-5 deciding match win in doubles action, while Lauren Leo's 6-1, 6-4 deciding match win in singles play secured the victory for the Red Storm.
Newly appointed head coach Allison Davidson posted one of the best individual records, 14-1 in singles action. Playing mostly at No. 5, Davidson's sole loss came against West Virginia in the opening round of the BIG EAST tournament. She rebounded and downed both Notre Dame and Boston College players and went on to pick up ESPN The Magazine All-District honors.
Blahutiakova also compiled an outstanding spring record, going 10-4 in singles and 10-5 in doubles. In singles action, Blahutiakova went 8-3 at No. 1 and 2-1 at No. 2, while producing a team best 10-2 doubles record with Bothova.
Bothova went 12-3 in singles play at No. 2 and No. 3 with her best performance of 11-1 at No. 2. She compiled a 13-2 overall doubles record playing in all three positions.
Other Red Storm standouts included Hande Gorur, who went 10-5 in singles play and 8-8 in doubles, and Lauren Leo, who grabbed an 11-3 singles finish and a 12-4 doubles record.
