12 - The Michigan Daily - Wednesday, March 26, 2003 Polo heads East to duel with division No luck for 'M' as Irish take ninth straight meet By Eric Ambinder Daily Sports Writer By Melanie Kebler Daily Sports Writer For Michigan water polo fans, this upcoming weekend may be con- fusing. The Wolverines will travel to Pennsylvania for the second half of the Southern Division Tournament, a competition they also competed in last weekend. Wondering why Michigan is in a "South- THIs I ern" athletic division? Mi( The Collegiate Water South Polo Association is Cham divided into Northern Wash and Southern Divisions. Tme: 1C Michigan is part of the p.m., 9:15 Allegheny Region, Noo which, along with the Mid-Atlantic Region, falls under the Southern Division. The Southern Division Tourna- ment is a chance for the teams from the Allegheny region to face each other before the conference champi- onships take place this April. Seedings for the championship are based on records from previous regional play, and the winner receives an automatic bid to the Eastern Championship. Other than the Southern Division Tournament, Michigan usually doesn't play the teams from the Allegheny region, opting instead for trips to California where the compe- tition is tougher. Coach Matt Anderson isn't too concerned with the seemingly com- plicated route to a division champi- onship. For he and his team, this weekend will be a chance to get back into a rhythm and start prepar- ing for the most important games of the season. "This weekend will allow us to get our bearings back," Anderson said. The team has gone three weeks without competing, except for an exhibition match against Michigan State last Friday. "We've been getting healthy and WEEKEND chigan at em Division' mpionships, hingon, Pa. 0:00 a.m., 4:15 p.m. Saturday, n Sunday (working on) condi- tioning. Now we'll be able to get our water polo minds back on." Anderson expects Gannon to be the toughest opponent this weekend. He described the team as "smaller and very fast" and added that they have been steadily improv- Way back in 1994, Forrest Gump won the Academy Award for Best Pic- ture, the Dallas Cowboys won the Super Bowl and the Michigan's women's ten- nis team beat Notre Dame - a feat the Wolverines haven't achieved since. For the ninth consecutive time, No. 27 Notre Dame (9-7 overall) defeated No. 28 Michigan (2-1 Big Ten, 9-4) 5- 2, christening its brand new Courtney Tennis Center on last night. "It was a good match, very competi- tive and hard fought," Michigan coach Bitsy Ritt said. "We just came up a little bit short." The teams split the first two doubles matches. Michelle Dacosta and Leanne Rutherford played exceptional in their 8-2 victory at No. 1 doubles. But in the deciding match, Notre Dame captured the doubles point, defeating the Wolver- ines 9-8 (7-3) at the No. 2 position. Despite their third doubles loss in four matches, the Wolverines played extremely well against a Notre Dame team that has an overall 8-7 singles record but is 10-5 in doubles play. "It was some of the best doubles that we've played this season," Ritt said. "We were just a few points away." In singles play, Michigan's Kim Plaushines won for the 10th time in her past 11 matches at No. 4, beating the Irish's Kristina Stastny 6-3, 6-3, and sophomore Michelle DaCosta collected a victory at the No. 1 position after her opponent withdrew due to injury. Although DaCosta and Plaushines reg- istered Michigan's only two points on the day, the other matches were decided by tie-breakers. Michigan's Leanne Rutherford lost narrowly to Notre Dame's Katie Cunha 6-3, 7-6 (7-4) at No. 3 singles, and at No. 5 singles, Joanne Musgrove lost in a third set tie-breaker 3-6, 6-0, 7-6 to Notre Dame's Sarah Jane Connelly. "Joanne played a very good singles match and played well at the end," Ritt said. "It just didn't go her way today." Ritt's teams have beaten the Irish only four times in 17 tries, but she believes this match was one of the hard- est fought in recent years. "The match was the most competi- tive we've played them in the last sever- al years," Ritt said. "We are gaining ground on them. It was so close today." Even though the Wolverines were riding the momentum of a four-match win streak and Notre Dame was playing their fourth match in six days, Michi- gan's loss didn't discourage the team. "While it could look like a negative on paper, our performance today was a real positive," Ritt said. "It should give us confidence going into this weekend." The Wolverines are anxious to kick off the back stretch of the Big Ten sea- son this weekend, hosting Minnesota and Iowa. They have won 12 consecu- tive matches at the Varsity Tennis Cen- ter dating back to last season. "We're so excited about returning to the Tennis Center," Ritt said. "We're obviously disappointed to lose today, but we recognize there are only a few things to correct. We're going to bounce back and get ready for Minnesota." 0 ing over the past few years. "Gannon is expected to be in the top eight at Easterns," he said. "That's the (game) I'm most con- cerned about. The other games, I don't expect to have much trouble." Michigan has had a history of domination in the Southern Division Tournament since the team's promo- tion to varsity status in 2001. The team is 8-0 in the last two competi- tions, even though last year, it played its intense rival Indiana twice. This year, however, injuries have taken out many of Michigan's usual starters. Of the injured players on the team, Anderson said "they haven't gotten any worse." Still, the Wolverines already lost standout freshman Megan Hausman earlier this season to a finger injury, and four more players will be sitting out this weekend. Jo Antonsen also has SETH LOWER/Daily Coach Matt Anderson and the Michigan water polo team will gain a bit of exposure to Southern Division foes this weekend in Pennsylvania. a finger injury, and starters Stephanie Rupp, Abbi Rowe and Julie Nisbet are not healthy enough to play either. "I would rather give (the injured players) an extra week to recover than risk playing them when they aren't 100 percent," Anderson said. The team has been training hard the past few weeks to prepare for its trip to Pennsylvania. Anderson said the team practiced extremely hard because in the coming weeks it won't have much time to condition or practice. "We're going to have a couple three-day practice weeks - that's why we've been going hard," he said, also citing an emphasis on physical training because of the stress of upcoming finals. "We've been doing a lot of swim- ming, and I've cut back on the men- tal aspect," he said "This allows the ladies to do physical work and not have to worry about learning plays." The Wolverines will play three games on Saturday, opening against Slippery Rock and facing Gannon and Washington and Jefferson later that evening. Michigan will play Washington and Jefferson a second time on Sunday to finish up the tournament. Golfers finish in sixth at Betsy Rawls Invite By Anne Ulble Daily Sports Writer Finding greenery among the dusty landscape of Texas, the Michigan women's golf team teed it up for the 30th annual Betsy Rawls Longhorn Invitational in Lakeway for a three-day tournament against 12 nationally- ranked teams from around the country. "We had some great competition this week," Michigan coach Kathy Teichert said. "And we really proved that we can stay up with the top teams in the nation." After the first day of the invitational, Michigan was tied for sixth place with Arkansas, but dropped a spot to UNLV on the second day of the tournament. The team regrouped for the final day of the tournament and concluded the three-day event in sixth place. "We finished up in the middle of the pack," Teichert said. "I think we could have done better, we kept making little errors that added up in the end. But I was pleased with how all the girls per- formed. I saw some good things from all of them. We were a little shaky through the tournament, but on the last day we came together, and we worked on some of our problems and started looking pretty good." Senior Kim Benedict was Michi- gan's top finalist, finishing the tourna- ment tied for 11th place. It was her fourth straight top-20 finish. "We were really hoping for a top- four finish for Kim," Teichert said. "But overall, I'm happy where she fin- ished. Her tempo and timing are the best I've seen over the past couple of weeks, and I think it's a great preview for the next couple of tournaments coming up." Following behind Benedict was sophomore Laura Olin, who shot a 76 on the last day of the tournament to secure a 20th-place finish. "Laura really held in there during her last round," Teichert said. "She improved her score and led us to our sixth-place overall finish." With the Big Ten Championship, approaching in less than a month, the team has two important conference tournaments against Indiana and Pur- due to get itself fully prepared. "We're going to try and get out on the course and get some much-needed practice time in," Teichert said. "But these next two matches will be the best chance for the girls to get fully pre- pared for the Championships." 0 9 Special rebate offer: Enroll now and get $100 back! 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