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Hawaii tennis star Petra Melounova’s spirited run in the NCAA women’s singles tournament came to an abrupt end in the round of 16 on Wednesday.
Melounova was cruising in her match against Texas Tech’s Felicity Maltby at the USTA National Campus in Orlando, Fla., looking for a third win in three days to stack another program milestone on those she’d already compiled.
But the duel turned on a dime, as the 22nd-ranked Maltby rattled off 12 straight games to eliminate the 61st-ranked Melounova 7-5, 6-0, after the UH junior led 5-1 in the first set.
Melounova, of the Czech Republic, finished with the deepest tournament run in UH history. The three-time Big West player of the year previously became the first Rainbow Wahine player to win an NCAA match her freshman year of 2017.
“I’m really happy I got to be here, and win the two matches,” Melounova said in a phone interview Wednesday night. “I think this has been a great end of the season. But yeah … I don’t think I fully showed what I could do here at the tournament. At the same time, I think I will be able to learn a lot from this match. Just maybe look back at it in a few days and see where I can improve.”
Her unconventional, underhanded serve — a result of a season-long shoulder injury — was not the deciding factor, she felt, as Maltby was handling the sliced entry balls consistently but not overwhelmingly.
Maltby had her share of unforced errors, including double faults, early in the match. But she cut them down in a hurry and snapped Melounova’s nine-match winning streak.
“I was able to play faster and mix it up a lot. But she changed the game,” Melounova said. “She was really resilient, and she’s a really good player. She made me move a lot. I think she really was able to turn it around; maybe she was tight at the beginning. So for some reason I just wasn’t able to figure out what to do. How to play her.”
High wind was also a factor. The gusts made it difficult to land precision shots down the line to stem Maltby’s momentum.
“I think I was definitely pushed this semester,” Melounova said. “I learned a lot as a player. I hope to remember that onto the next year I have. Now I know as long as I fight I can really beat anyone.”
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