No. 36 ASU tennis wasn't able to take advantage of the opportunity to get a statement win on Friday against one of the top teams in the country.
The Sun Devils opened up their Pac-12 slate against No. 2 California, falling 5-2 at the Whiteman Tennis Center. It was the second straight loss as the team dropped to 6-4 overall and 0-1 in conference play.
"Cal's tough, they're really good all the way down the line," head coach Sheila McInerney said. "But it's disappointing, I mean we lost five matches in straight sets so we have to be better than that tomorrow."
The day started off like it has for much of the spring season: ASU grabbed the doubles point fairly easily. Seniors Desirae Krawczyk and Stephanie Vlad picked up a 6-1 win on court two while juniors Kassidy Jump and Gussie O'Sullivan sealed the point with a 6-3 victory on the third doubles court.
It didn't go quite as well in singles. ASU could manage just one win in singles play as Cal's depth overwhelmed the Sun Devils.
On the lower courts, juniors Alexandra Osborne and Gussie O'Sullivan suffered losses to sophomore Karla Popovic and freshman Olivia Hauger, respectively. Vlad also lost in straight sets on court number four.
With the loss, Vlad fell to 3-3 since returning from a shin injury that kept her sidelined for the first month of the season.
"I'm hoping I can be a bit more consistent, I'm still trying to find my game a little bit, Vlad said. "Hopefully I can pick it up a bit to be that solid win at four, especially with Pac-12 play starting."
Fellow senior Krawczyk is also looking to find some consistency, but she's competing well against some of the best in the nation. Following an upset victory over the nations' top player Francesca Di Lorenzo last weekend, Krawczyk fell to No. 10 Maegan Manasse on the first court 6-4, 7-5.
Manasse isn't Cal's only top-10 player. Senior Klara Fabikova, number five in the country, was looking to help Cal sweep in singles play.
Jump was able to prevent this on court two. She snapped her two-match losing streak with a win over Fabikova. Jump, whose last two matches ended in third-set losses, said that it was nice to finish one off.
"My last few matches have been tough, I've been right there," said Jump. "It's great to beat a ranked player like that."
She added that she thought her team had chances to win. ASU was unable to, though, but will get another chance on Saturday when it hosts No. 20 Stanford at noon.
McInerney said this will be another good test for the team.
"We aren't as strong as Cal is right now," she said. "Hopefully we're going to be as strong as Stanford is tomorrow, but we'll have to wait and see on that one."
Reach the reporter at mfaye@asu.edu or follow @mattGfaye on Twitter.
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