University of Houston Athletics
Cardenas Chosen as American Player of the Week
3/10/2015 12:00:00 AM | Tennis
PROVIDENCE, R.I. - University of Houston junior Maria Cardenas has been named American Athletic Conference Women's Tennis Player of the Week, it was announced today by the league office. The weekly honor is the first for Cardenas as a collegian.
A native of Caracas, Venezuela, Cardenas is the fourth Houston student-athlete to win the award this season, and the third different Cougar to be honored in the last three weeks. Sophomore Despoina Vogasari was the conference's top performer on Jan. 27 and Feb. 10, senior Elena Kordolaimi won the award on Feb. 24, and junior Rocio Martin was honored on March 3. Patrick Sullivan's team has captured five of the eight awards this season.
Cardenas continued a recent run of strong play in Houston's two wins last week. On March 4 in a 5-0 sweep of Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, the junior was ahead of Kerry Galhos, 7-5, 3-1, when her match was halted.
Three days later in a 6-1 win over No. 52 Texas, Cardenas captured two crucial victories. She teamed with Tina Rupert to clinch the doubles point, 7-5, over Lana Groenvynck and Neda Koprcina. In singles, Cardenas scored the decisive point with a 6-3, 6-0 victory over Lina Padegimaite.
The victory was the first in Houston history over the Longhorns.
Cardenas also clinched Houston's February victories over No. 48 Utah and No. 36 Brown. For the season, she is 12-9 in singles play and 8-6 in pairs matches.
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No. 34 Houston (10-4) finishes a three-match home stand on Saturday against Memphis. The match begins at 1 pm CT at Houston Country Club, with live scoring available at UHCougars.com/TennisScores . Houston will be going for their seventh consecutive victory.
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