Lady Aggies rally to top UCO in spring opener

LAWTON, Okla. (Feb. 20) - Cameron University's women's tennis team got their spring schedule underway in solid fashion Friday. Coach James Helvey's Lady Aggies fell behind 2-1 after doubles play, but rallied for a 6-3 victory over Lone Star Conference rival Central Oklahoma at the CU Tennis Complex.

The Lady Aggies are scheduled to host Tarleton State and Northeastern State on Saturday, in matches scheduled to start at 9 a.m., and 2 p.m., respectively.

Cameron got off to a shaky start, dropping two of three doubles matches to UCO on Friday. Madeley Ameerali and Taylor Ivie teamed to win the No. 2 doubles match, but Cameron came up short in the other two to spot the Bronchos the early lead in the match.

"This was our first match of the spring and you could tell that there were a lot of nerves out there," Helvey said. "But our girls were able to settle down and our conditioning proved to be the difference. You could really tell that their (UCO's) girls were dragging at the end of the singles matches."

Conditioning appeared to play a clear role in two of the matches. Carolina Vera-Vera won the No. 1 singles match by default after splitting the first two sets with UCO's Stephanie Johns. Paulina Trujillo lost the second set of her No. 2 singles match with UCO's Sarah Bowman, but stormed back to win the third set 6-1. Cameron also got singles victories from Marianne Reeves, Ivie and Sandra-Leigh King.

Central Oklahoma's only singles point of the match came at No. 3, where Erin Parriott defeated Cameron's Madeley Ameerali in straight sets.

Cameron 6, Central Oklahoma 3
Singles
1. Carolina Vera-Vera, Cameron, def. Stephanie Johns, 3-6, 6-3, default
2. Paulina Trujillo, Cameron, def. Sarah Bowman, 6-2, 2-6, 6-1
3. Erin Parriott, Central Oklahoma, def. Madeley Ameerali, 6-2, 6-4
4. Marianne Reeves, Cameron, def. Kimberly Kimak, 6-2, 6-3
5. Taylor Ivie, Cameron, def. Kristin DeBruin, 6-2, 6-3
6. Sandra-Leigh King, Cameron, def. Christy Jones, 6-2, 6-1
Doubles
1. Parriott/Kimak, Central Oklahoma, def. Vera-Vera/Trujillo, 8-6
2. Ameerali/Ivie, Cameron, def. Bowman/DeBruin, 8-0
3. Johns/Jones, Central Oklahoma, def. Kris Biegert/King, 8-2