It may have been a week late, but the Cardinals finally took on the Dayton Flyers last night. Ball State remained undefeated, escaping with a 7-0 victory.
Still, coach Kathy Bull said she thinks the team was challenged, as she wanted.
"We did get the challenge we expected. I would even liked to have seen our middle players be challenged a little more, but, you know, that goes with the territory," she said. "I like what I see, I like what we're doing, cause things are going to heat up now."
The Cardinals (3-0) dominated Dayton (2-4) in the doubles point, winning all three matches.
"It's always great sweeping the doubles point; I was thrilled about that," Bull said.
The closest doubles match came with Ball State's Katie Owans and Melissa Roach facing Dayton's Erin Kirkland and Courtney McDowell, coming out with the 8-5 victory.
"I was really pleased with our No. 1 team, especially the play of Katie Owans," Bull said. "When things got tough, I knew that Mel, my senior, she was all right, but Katie really stepped it up, and that was the difference in that match."
In singles, the Cardinals continued to dominate, with only Owans and Roach losing sets. That moves the Cardinals to 44-2 overall in single sets.
Roach's match against Kirkland went into a super-tiebreaker, where players vie to get to ten points and win by two.
"What they would normally do is play an entire set, but it's late at night and (Dayton) has to travel," Bull said. "If they kept playing we'd still be here another 40 minutes, especially the way they were playing."
Elsewhere in doubles, Jenny Batty scored a 6-1, 6-0 victory against McDowell.
"Jenny Batty played really well today," Bull said. "For her to move on the court like that is something we've been working on for years, so I'm really pleased to see that."
Jill Wieman, Katie Owens, Jessica Thompson and Susan Kelly all had victories, with only Owens going into a third set.
"Jill Wieman at (No.) 3 really dominated her opponent," Bull said. "Owans got off to a little bit of a rough start there on (No.) 4, and she settled after that first set and made the adjustments she needed to. Our two in the back (No. 5 and No. 6), Kelly and our freshman Thompson, they were on task the whole time."
Now the Cardinals begin to prepare for Michigan State, who comes to Muncie this Sunday.
"I still would have loved to have it last week cause now I don't have as much time to prepare for Michigan State Sunday, cause we worked fairly hard tonight, but we have a court situation cause of the men's match," Bull said. "We'll just go in tomorrow and work on a couple little things, and then we get a day off of rest on Friday, and then we'll see."
"It's just about how much you can learn about yourself when you go out there," Bull said. "I have a few notes in my head of things I've learned today, and we'll just keep working on it."
After the Cardinals host Michigan State, they go on a seven-match road trip.
"If you look at our schedule, it's gonna heat up and we're gonna learn a little bit more about ourselves," Bull said. "But it's pretty much where I expected and I felt pretty lucky that we came away with a 7-0 victory on that one."
Read More
Three Air Jam teams take home the win
October 12, 2012Nineteen teams shimmied, shook and flipped for a sold out John R. Emens Auditorium on Thursday night during the 25th annual Air Jam.
Bill Clinton Speaks at North Central High School
October 12, 2012Former President's Speech Could Have Effect on State Senate Race
