Orlando, FL
On November 10th, we hit the road to Orlando once again. After playing in the semifinals the previous Friday, we felt more prepared than ever heading into this tournament. Having yet another event in Florida helped keep our costs low—and with that, our pressure as well.
In the round of 16, we faced an unseeded team—yet one that looked stronger on paper. Their lineup featured a Romanian ranked 400 and an American ranked 700. After performing so well the week before, we felt no pressure heading into the match and started off loose and confident. It showed in the results. We came out on fire and quickly crushed their momentum. We made very few errors, and there wasn’t much they could do to slow us down. We took the win 6–2, 6–0 in what felt like an unbelievable match on our part. Our momentum was building, but so was our confidence in our shots, resulting in some very clean, very pretty tennis.
For the quarterfinals, we played a Romanian team ranked 1000 and 700. They currently played doubles together at LSU and had already taken out a seeded pair in their first match. The first set was neck and neck, with both teams holding serve. We earned an important break late in the set, allowing us to take it 6–4. Riding that momentum, we jumped out to a 5–1 lead in the second. But with nothing to lose, the girls came out swinging. They started going for unbelievable shots—and were executing them. It became difficult to shift the momentum back in our favor, but we found a way. At 5–4, on a deuce sudden-death point, we finally closed out the match, winning 6–4, 6–4.
Once again, we felt we had played a strong match. We may have allowed the momentum to swing too easily, but they didn’t roll over—they made us work for it, and that ultimately made us better. This win meant we were heading to our second-ever semifinals, and our second in a row!
Our semifinal matchup was never going to be easy. We were up against American twins ranked around 300 in the world. We had played them about a year earlier and remembered how difficult their pressure at the net had been to handle. Sure enough, that’s exactly what we ran into again. It felt like they were smothering us at the net, and we struggled to find comfortable ways to counter. The match felt very similar to our previous semifinal, where our opponents rushed the net on nearly every ball—but this team had far better volleys. Despite playing as well as we could, there wasn’t much we could do in the moment to turn things our way. We lost 2–6, 1–6.
Even so, this tournament left us feeling more confident in our games than ever. We had now made back-to-back semifinals in W35Ks in Florida, which host some of the toughest competition. We were playing some of the best tennis of our careers, and our tournament streak wasn’t over yet. We went home on Friday with a few days to regroup and gear up for a local tournament in Boca Raton.
Points Earned: 14
Price Breakdown
Gas: $55
Food: $75
Hotel: $295
Tournament Entry: $20 x 2 =$40
Total Cost: $465
Total Earnings: $460
