Hilo opened its season by going on the road to win two matches and the Team of the Week award. Dominican's Audrey Rafols went 3-0 at No. 1 singles for the Penguins to gain Player of the Week honors.
PLAYER OF THE WEEK: Dominican's Audrey Rafols, Jr., 5-0, Vallejo, Calif.
Audrey Rafols won three singles matches on Court 1 and went 2-1 in doubles action for Dominican last week. Rafols, a two-time Second Team All-PacWest selection in singles, won in straight sets against CS Los Angeles and Fresno Pacific, and then rallied for a three-set victory over Hawai'i Hilo's McKenna Mountain, 5-7, 6-3, 6-2. In doubles, also on Court 1, Rafols teamed with Gina Dudley for a 6-4 win over CSULA, 6-0 over the Vulcans and suffered a narrow 7-5 loss to FPU. On the season, the junior is 5-0 in singles and 4-1 in doubles.
TEAM OF THE WEEK
Hawai'i Hilo Vulcans
Hawai'i Hilo was the final PacWest team to begin its season but have done so in impressive fashion with two road victories. The Vulcans held on for a 4-3 victory over Dominican on Saturday and then topped Stanislaus State on Sunday, 6-1. Against the Penguins, who came into the match with a 4-0 record, the Vulcans dropped the doubles point and lost matches on singles Courts 1 and 2. They rallied back, though, with straight-sets victorie on Court 3 (Hikari Osaki), Court 4 (Satoho Toriumi) and Court 5 (Julia Barden). Hana Hofmanova then prevailed on Court 6 in three sets over Astrid Craig, 6-1, 4-6, 6-3. Against the Warriors, UH Hilo won on all courts except No. 1 singles.
PACWEST NEWS AND NOTES: Point Loma went 2-0 on the week with victories over CS Los Angeles (7-0) and Biola (5-2). The battle with the Eagles was closer than the score would indicate with four of the six singles matches going three sets. The reigning Player of the Week Arianna Audelo went 2-0 in singles and 2-0 in doubles...Concordia won 6-1 over Biola and then lost by the same score to Azusa Pacific. CUI's Sophie Ranchor went 2-0 in singles play in those matches, defeating No. 21 ranked Abigail Wild (APU) on court one, 6-4, 6-3 and Biola's Colbeyshae Emery, 6-3, 6-3. The German sophomore is now 4-0 in singles play this season...Academy of Art's only loss this year has been to Division I Portland State. They have defeated Menlo, Stanislaus State and Fresno Pacific by the combined score of 18-0...HPU beat Chaminade, 7-0...Westmont topped Division III Whittier, 7-2...MSU-Denver went to Texas and lost to Lubbock Christian (4-3) and Harding (Ark.), 4-1.
ITA RANKINGS: The first college rankings of 2024 came out on Feb. 14 with HPU representing the PacWest at No. 15. In the last singles and doubles listings (Nov. '23), the PacWest had four players ranked--No. 8 Emily Hafner (MSUD), No. 16 Miruna Tudor (APU), No. 21 Madison Kane (APU) and No. 39 Amanda Letzring (PLNU). In doubles, the November ranking had Concordia's Tiffany Carrillo and Sophie Ranchor at No. 10, Biola's Alex Mann and Brooke Fager at No. 11 and APU's Madison Kane and Julia Jordan at No. 24.
THIS WEEK IN THE PACWEST: There are a number of matches this week involving PacWest vs. PacWest schools. On Monday, Hilo wraps up its road trip at Academy of Art and Concordia goes to Westmont. On Tuesday, CUI is at Fresno Pacific and the Golden Eagles will travel to ART U on Thursday. On Friday, Dominican is at Stanislaus State and Colorado Mesa goes to Biola. Saturday features Hawaii Hilo at Chaminade, Stanislaus State at Fresno Pacific and Colorado Mesa at Azusa Pacific. On Sunday, Hilo will rematch with Dominican, this time on Oahu.
