Petra Melounova of the University of Hawaii women’s tennis team has qualified for the 2018 NCAA Division I Singles Championship for the second straight year.
Melounova earned the Big West’s automatic bid by being the highest ranked singles player. Melounova came in at No. 80 in the latest Intercollegiate Tennis Association poll.
This marks the fourth time in the past five years that a Hawaii player has qualified for the NCAA tournament. Cindy Nguyen qualified in 2014 and 2015, and Nguyen and Melounova qualified last season.
Melounova is the only player from the Big West to be competing in this month’s tournament. The tournament runs from May 23-28 at the Wake Forest Tennis Complex in Winston-Salem, N.C.
UH claims Big West tennis honors
Three days after winning its first Big West tournament championship, the University of Hawaii women’s tennis team claimed two of the conference’s top honors on Wednesday.
Rainbow Wahine sophomore Petra Melounova was named the Big West player of the year for the second straight year and Jun Hernandez was voted coach of the year.
Melounova is the seventh player in conference history to win back-to-back player of the year awards. She went 14-3 at No. 1 singles and defeated 10th-ranked Michaela Gordon of Stanford on March 25. She will return to the NCAA singles championship as the Big West’s highest ranked player at No. 80 in the nation.
Senior Marina Hruba and sophomore Nikola Dolakova were named to the All-Big West singles second team and junior Roxanne Resma earned honorable mention.
Melounova and Resma made the first-team doubles list as did Dolakova and senior Klara Pribylova. Hruba and sophomore Alzbeta Houbova were honorable mention.
The Rainbow Wahine will face Michigan in the first round of the NCAA tournament on May 11 in Stanford, Calif.
>> UH senior Felix Albert and Blaz Seric were named to the Big West men’s tennis singles second team. Albert and Fabian Woehrl made the doubles second team.
Randle out, Mitchell in for Wahine hoops
The Hawaii women’s basketball team on Wednesday announced the hiring of Khalilah Mitchell to Laura Beeman’s coaching staff for the 2018-19 season.
Mitchell replaces assistant coach Berry Randle, who spent a single year on the Rainbow Wahine bench. Mitchell was last a full NCAA assistant at Central Florida from 2012-14, and since has helped the Knights as director of program development. She will take the lead in player development for the Wahine, who went 12-18 (5-11 Big West) in 2017-18.
“I’m humbled and excited all at once,” Mitchell, a former player at LSU (2004-08), said in a UH release. “I can’t find the words to express my excitement about this opportunity to return to coaching, but more importantly the opportunity to serve as a guide in the development of our ladies. I want to thank Coach Beeman for awarding me the opportunity to continue my life’s mission.”
It is the third straight offseason Beeman has replaced at least two of her three full assistants. Alex Delanian recently returned after a year at UC Santa Barbara, replacing Darron Larsen, who was forced to depart at midseason because of a work visa issue.
