Tallahassee, Fla. - Success on the doubles courts has become the norm for the Stetson women's tennis program over the last 12 months, but a new Hatter pair got in on the action this week when rising sophomore Jen Miller (Tampa, Fla.) and incoming freshman MayaBlue Stauffer-MacDowell (Asheville, N.C.) teamed up for a championship at an Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) Summer Circuit event on the Florida State University campus.
Miller and Stauffer-MacDowell began the tournament with an 8-1 rout of Kimberlee Landrum (Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College) and Jeannette McDonald (Saint Leo) on Wednesday before gutting out wins in three consecutive matches on Thursday. The Stetson pair edged Tulane's Lindsay Dvorak and her younger sister Emily 8-6 in the quarterfinals, bounced UCF's Jenna Doerfler and Allison Hodges 8-5 in the semifinals and then finished off their title run with a hard-fought 9-8 triumph over Whitney Wolf and Ebie Wilson of LSU.
This title comes shortly after another Stetson doubles duo, Valentina Galbarini '10 (Montevideo, Uruguay) and rising sophomore Carolina de los Santos (Montevideo, Uruguay) reached the second round of the NCAA doubles tournament and finished the 2009-10 season ranked 48th in the nation.
Another incoming Hatter, Lindsey Cable (Gainesville, Fla.) teamed with Valparaiso's Abby Wright to reach the second round of the doubles draw; all three Stetson student-athletes also competed in the singles competition, where Cable and Miller advanced to the second round. Cable defeated West Virginia's Katie Haught 6-1, 6-4 while Miller defeated Wright 6-1, 6-1.
Cable, Stauffer-MacDowell, Susana Aguirre (Guayaquil, Ecuador) and Sierra Sullivan (Austin, Texas) form a quartet of newcomers to Head Coach Sasha Schmid's program in 2010-11. The foursome join a strong returning cast that includes Miller, de los Santos, the Atlantic Sun Conference Freshman of the Year and Second Team All-Atlantic Sun selection Unnati Purushotham (Hyderabad, India).
