Mount Olive women’s tennis players earn honors at Methodist Fall Invitational

FAYETTEVILLE – The University of Mount Olive women’s tennis team featured a pair of doubles champions and a singles champion this weekend at the Methodist Fall Invitational.

UMO featured nine players in the individual competition, which took place from Friday through Sunday. The Trojans competed in the three-day event against a variety of local schools, including Methodist, Averett, North Carolina Wesleyan and Barton.

Junior Jessica Aylward finished play at the invitational with a perfect 6-0 record, including three wins in singles play. As a team, Mount Olive collected 16 wins in singles action with seven players claiming multiple wins at the event.

In doubles, junior Nele Weber and freshman Laura Servien captured the doubles title in Flight #1 after registering a pair of wins on Friday, while the duo of senior Ingrid Montserrat and freshman Oriana Izarra finished as the runner-up in the same bracket.

Aylward and freshman Lea Edelstein recorded a perfect 3-0 mark in Flight #2 behind a pair of 8-3 victories before securing an 8-4 win in the finals over Osenyonye Nwokolo and Alexandra Saez of Barton.

In singles, Aylward finished her weekend undefeated with three wins in Flight #4 to collect the individual title. She won in straight sets in the initial two matches before securing a 2-6, 6-3, 10-4 victory over Grace McCartney of Barton.

Izarra and Weber both registered runner-up finishes in their brackets behind 2-1 records. Esser and senior Maria Impalea both advanced to the third place match in their flights and posted wins to finish with 2-1 marks on Sunday.

The Trojans return to tournament action at the Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) Regionals hosted in Sumter, South Carolina, from Sept. 23-26.