Waves Women’s Tennis has Top Ranked Players

Pepperdine women’s tennis player Ashley Lahey amassed several honors during her freshman campaign that ended in the NCAA Singles Championship quarterfinal. Due to her success, the second-year Wave is beginning this season as one of the highest rated players in the Oracle/Intercollegiate Tennis Association’s singles ranking. 

Lahey, the West Coast Conference Freshman of the Year last season and an All-WCC first-team honoree in singles and doubles, is positioned behind only two players in the 125-person singles ranking: UCLA’s Ena Shibahara and Texas Tech’s Gabriela Talaba.

And she isn’t the only member of the eighth-ranked Waves women’s tennis team in the preseason singles and doubles rankings.

Mayar Sherif, Jessica Failla and Laura Gulbe are all listed in the singles rankings. Doubles partners—Lahey/Sherif and Failla/Dzina Milovanovic—are in the doubles rankings. 

The rankings were released nine days before Pepperdine’s men’s and women’s teams host the Oracle/ITA Masters this week at Pepperdine and the Malibu Racquet Club, and before next month’s Riviera ITA Women’s All-American Tennis Championships at Pepperdine and Riviera Tennis Club in Pacific Palisades. Both events will showcase top tennis talent from across the country.

Sherif, a senior, is 10 spots behind Lahey in the rankings. Ranked 13th, she was an ITA All-American and All-WCC first-teamer last season. Failla, a junior transfer from USC and former All-Pac 12 second-teamer, is ranked 16th. The senior Gulbe, an All-WCC second team honoree last season, is ranked 66th. 

Sherif and Lahey are ranked 10th in the doubles standings. Sherif was half of the Pepperdine pair that finished last season atop in the rankings. She was a doubles All-American along with her graduated partner, Christine Maddox. Lahey was named the All-WCC first team last season as a doubles player. 

Failla and Milovanovic, a junior, are ranked 39th in doubles. Failla had a winning doubles record at USC, and Milovanovic, paired with graduated Apichaya Runglerdkriangkrai, was an All-WCC second teamer last season. 

Additionally, Failla, Lahey and Sherif were advanced to the main draw of the Riviera/ITA All-American Championship singles field. Lahey and Sherif were advanced in the doubles field. 

Gulbe earned a straight bid for the event’s qualifying singles round, while Failla and Milovanovic are in the prequalifying doubles draw. The two are also doubles or singles alternatives. 

The championships will feature 64 singles and 32 doubles partnerships competing in multiple rounds of tennis action.