Pitt
Hurricane Invitational
Amanda Wickman Leads Pitt Tennis at Hurricane Invitational
9/21/2014 12:00:00 AM | Women's Tennis
Hurricane Invitational Results | Season Statistics
MIAMI – In the Panthers first tournament of the season, Amanda Wickman highlighted the weekend for the University of Pittsburgh women’s tennis team as she inched closer to the 100 career win milestone at the Hurricane Invitational hosted by the University of Miami.
Wickman and her doubles teammate Amber Washington took third place in the Green bracket by going 2-1 together. The duo opened the tournament with an 8-4 win over USF’s Argente/Grillo before falling to Miami’s Zhang/Lohan in the semifinals. In the third place match, Wickman and Washington topped Auburn’s Lewis/Dikosavljevic, 8-6.
Wickman also won her opening round singles match as she once again defeated Argente of USF. Wickman would drop her next two matches, but with her three victories this weekend she now has 99 for her career. She is poised to become the 15th player in program history to record 100 career wins.
On the weekend, the Panthers finished 7-13 overall in singles and 5-6 in doubles against some of the top players in the country. Also at the Hurricane Invitational was Auburn, Baylor, USF and North Florida. Four of the six team’s at the tournament were ranked inside the ITA top-35 at the end of last season.
"This weekend was a solid start for Pitt tennis," head coach Alex Santos said. "To have have a couple of our players leave one of the best tournaments in the country with positive records in singles shows us that we are moving in the right direction. I was happy to see how well we responded physically in the high levels of heat and humidity. It was also rewarding to see that the things we have been working on in practice are sinking in. With that being said, it will always be about going a little further, giving a little bit more of ourselves and pushing the level of expectation even higher."
Lolade Ogungbesan and Katherine Castro finished singles competition at 2-1 and won their consolation brackets. They both lost their opening round matches but rebounded to win their final two contests.
The Panthers will travel to Northwestern next weekend to participate in the Wildcat Invitational. 
