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No. 14 Cal Plays No. 5 Waves For Third Time This Year

Mar 28, 2022

BERKELEY – For the third time this season, the 14th-ranked California women's tennis team will play No. 5 Pepperdine, with the Golden Bears and Waves facing off in a nonconference match on Tuesday at 12 p.m. at the Hellman Tennis Complex.
 
The match will mark the teams' first contest in Berkeley this year. Previously, Cal defeated Pepperdine, 4-3, on Jan. 22 in Malibu, and the Waves beat the Bears, 4-1 on Feb. 12 in Madison, Wisconsin (see below).
 
Cal has a 10-5 record, while Pepperdine is 13-3.
 
Admission is free to regular-season matches at the Hellman Tennis Complex. Fans can also follow the action and scores at Hellman via the live stream by clicking here and can follow updates of Cal matches at @CalWomensTennis.
 
Under current state and local guidelines, fans attending events held in outdoor venues are strongly encouraged to wear facial coverings at all times.
 
Last Time: No. 14 Cal Beats No. 17 USC In Berkeley
Hannah Viller Moeller won in straight sets at court-five singles – beating Grace Piper, 6-4, 6-4 – to clinch 14th-ranked Cal's 4-3 victory over No. 17 USC on Saturday afternoon at the Hellman Tennis Complex. The Bears clinched the doubles point when the 29th-ranked duo of freshmen Katja Wiersholm and Jessica Alsola beat the Trojans' 64th-ranked Piper and Eryn Cayetano, 6-3, on court one.
 
Poll Position: Bears Earned Numerous Rankings Last Week
Cal was ranked 14th in last week's ITA and Tennis Channel/USTA team polls. The Bears also have three doubles teams ranked in the top 50, including Cal's duo of Jessica Alsola and Katja Wiersholm, who are ranked 29th, Haley Giavara and Valentina Ivanov, who are ranked 35th, and Alsola and Erin Richardson, who are ranked 45th. While Alsola and Richardson (10-4 record) owe much of their ranking to their success in the fall – when the two reached the semifinals of the ITA Northwest Regional Championships and qualified for the ITA Fall National Championships – the newer duo of Alsola and Wiersholm has posted a 6-0 record in the spring and played at court-one doubles in the last three dual matches. Giavara and Ivanov have a 14-5 record that includes a 9-0 mark in tournament play.
 
In singles, Alsola (26-2) is ranked 62nd, followed by Giavara (10-10) at No. 101 and Wiersholm (17-0) at No. 122. Wiersholm stayed unbeaten in singles this season with a 6-4, 6-3 win over USC's 77th-ranked Snow Han on Saturday at Hellman.
 
Scouting the Bears

  • Freshman Jessica Alsola reached the singles semifinals of the ITA Northwest Regional Championships in the fall and earned her first Pac-12 Player of the Week honor (see below) on Jan. 25
  • Junior Haley Giavara was a singles All-American and the ITA Northwest Regional Rookie of the Year as a freshman
  • Wiersholm has clinched four of Cal's nine wins, including March 18 against Utah and March 6 against Oregon
  • Wiersholm clinched Cal's first two wins of the season in the first two matches of her career against UC Santa Barbara and Pepperdine
  • Cal has won the doubles point in 10 of its 15 dual matches
  • Former two-time NCAA doubles champion Amanda Augustus – the 2021 Pac-12 Coach of the Year and ITA Northwest Region Coach of the Year – is in her 15th year as head coach at her alma mater
  • Associate head coach Zack Warren – the 2021 ITA Northwest Region Assistant Coach of the Year – is in his eighth year on the staff.

Scouting the Waves

  • Pepperdine won 4-0 at San Francisco on Monday
  • The Waves have won seven straight matches
  • Prior to the USF match, Pepperdine posted a pair of 4-0 wins over No. 29 UC Santa Barbara on March 23 and No. 21 Loyola Marymount on March 26
  • Seven waves are ranked in singles: No. 9 Shiori Fukuda, No. 17 Lisa Zaar, No. 36 Taisiya Pachkaleva, No. 51 Victoria Flores, No. 79 Janice Tjen and No. 82 Savannah Broadus
  • In doubles, Broadus and Tjen are ranked 16th, Flores and Zaar are ranked 17th, and Flores and Tjen are ranked 43rd
  • Per Nillson is in his seventh season as Pepperdine's head coach

This Season vs. Pepperdine
Cal's 4-3 victory over Pepperdine on Jan. 22 was a coming out party for Katja Wiersholm.
 
The freshman had already clinched the Bears' dual-match opening win at UC Santa Barbara on Jan. 21, but the win over the Waves was Wiersholm's first match against a top-five opponent. She secured the victory with a 7-5, 7-5 win over the Waves' Nikki Redelijk.
 
After Pepperdine won the doubles point, Cal turned things around in singles with wins from Viller Moeller, who beat 36th-ranked Savannah Broadus, 6-1, 6-3, on court six; Julia Rosenqvist, who defeated Janice Tjen, 6-2, 6-3, on court four; and Jessica Alsola, who prevailed over the 30th-ranked Victoria Flores, 6-2, 6-3, on court three, before Wiersholm ended the match.
 
The teams met again in the quarterfinals of the ITA National Team Indoor Championship on Feb. 12 in Madison. After another hard-fought match, the fourth-ranked/fourth-seeded Bears lost to the fifth-ranked/fifth-seeded Waves, 4-1.
 
This time Cal took the early lead. The Bears' Rosenqvist and Erin Richardson defeated Shiori Fukuda and Anastasia Iamachkine, 7-5, on court three, and then Haley Giavara and Valentina Ivanov defeated a quality Pepperdine pair in the 11th-ranked Victoria Flores and Lisa Zaar, 6-4, on court one to clinch the doubles point.
 
But Cal lost four times in singles, including three three-setters, to fall to Pepperdine. Cal's 110th-ranked junior Valentina Ivanov lost to the 10th-ranked Zaar, 3-6, 7-5, 6-0, on court two to end the match.
 
Jessica Alsola Named Pac-12 Player of the Week
Cal freshman Jessica Alsola earned the Pac-12 Player of the Week honor on Jan. 25 after she helped the Golden Bears open the dual-match season 2-0 on the road. This is the first Pac-12 honor for Alsola and the first of the season for Cal.
 
Alsola picked up a big win in ninth-ranked Cal's 4-3 win over No. 2 Pepperdine on Jan. 22, defeating the 30th-ranked Victoria Flores at court-three singles, 6-3, 7-6(5), in Malibu. One day earlier, Alsola beat Camille Kiss, 3-6, 6-1, 6-3, in Cal's 6-1 rout of UC Santa Barbara.
 
Along with her No. 62 singles ranking, Alsola is ranked seventh in the ITA Newcomer poll.
 
Stay Posted
For further coverage of the Bears, follow them on Twitter (@CalWomensTennis), Instagram (@CalWomensTennis) and Facebook (@CalWomensTennis).
 
Next Time
Cal hits the road and returns to conference action when the Bears play at No. 32 Arizona State on Friday at 1:30 p.m. MST/PDT and at No. 48 Arizona on Saturday at 12 p.m. MST/PDT.