WALLA WALLA, Wash. – With all of the elite talent of the Northwest Conference in action, the Linfield Wildcats had a strong showing at the ITA Fall Regionals this weekend. Tessa Kern was a finalist in the singles bracket, whereas Michelle Uyeda and the doubles team of Kern and Riley Clayeux finished in the semifinal round of each bracket.
 
The defending NWC champions, the Wildcats have their eyes set on repeating as the standard of excellence in the conference and coach Lisa Macy-Baker was impressed with what she for her players this weekend, but there is room for improvement.
 
"Overall, it was a good showing, especially in our singles play. We have some work to do to get where we need to be to win another conference championship but I think this team will embrace the challenge," said Macy-Baker.
 
SINGLES MAIN DRAW
Linfield had eight participants in the 64-player main singles draw, with six of them being seeded. Uyeda received the number one overall seed and Kern received the three seed, whereas Clayeux, Michelle Ly, Lexie Matsunaga, and Allena Wong receiving 9-16 seeds.
 
Senior Sarah Sweet and sophomore Maggie Fiocchi, were unseeded and fell in the first round. Sweet fell Sydnie Binder of Pacific, who fell to Kern in the semifinals. Fiocchi fell to Camilla Tarpey-Schwed of Whitman in three sets. Ly fell to Jennifer Wong of Whitman in the first round as well.
 
Clayeux and Matsunaga both advanced to the Round of 16. Clayeux fell to eight seed, Lisa Owen of Puget Sound, in the third set tiebreaker whereas Matsunaga fell to seven seed, Sydnie Binder of Pacific, who was a semifinalist.
 
Andei Fukushige of Whitman won the ITA Fall Regional, three players from Linfield played along the way. Wong fell to Fukushige in the Round of 16, Uyeda fell to the eventual champ in the semifinal round and defeated Kern in the final.
 
Uyeda dropped just three games in the first four rounds as she finished in the top four, losing the eventual champ, 6-1 7-6.
 
Kern advanced in the third set over Sydnie Binder of Pacific in the semifinals and lost to Fukushige, 6-2 6-3 in the championship round.
 
With rain forcing the entire tournament to be played indoors, the semifinalists had to play at 9 a.m. on Monday morning after the last match on Sunday finished at 2 a.m. on Sunday night/early Monday morning.
 
DOUBLES MAIN DRAW
The Wildcats had four pairs participate in the doubles draw and all four were seeded in the 32-team field. Clayeux and Kern were the two seed, Uyeda and Matsunaga were the three seed and the pairs of Fiocchi/Sweet and Ly/Wong received the five seeds.
 
Fiocchi and Sweet advanced to the quarterfinals without dropping a game, but fell to Andrea Gu and Fukushige of Whitman, 8-4 in the pro set. Gu and Fukushige went on to win the doubles crown.
 
Ly and Wong advanced to the second round, falling to Sydnie Binder and Adrienne Powell of Pacific, 8-6.
 
The tandem of Uyeda and Matsunaga advanced to the quarterfinals before losing to Lisa Owen and Laura Bryan of Puget Sound, 8-7, the tiebreaker score was 7-5 towards the Loggers.
 
Semifinalists Kern and Clayeux, defeated Bridget Myers and Barclay Fagg of Puget Sound, Madelyn Landerfelt and Caitlin Jones of Lewis & Clark and Audrey Grigore and Irene Tsai of Whitman along the way to the semifinals. The Linfield duo fell to Nastyia Redkina and Angel Le of Whitman, 8-5 in the penultimate round.
 
The Wildcats finished a strong fall season at the ITA Fall Regionals, the full spring schedule will be released later on this year.