Ashworth Reaches 600 Wins as Duke Defeats Illinois, 4-2

Saturday, January 20

Durham, N.C.

6 p.m.

Duke University

Illinois

Photo by: Bri Shaw, Duke Athletics

Ashworth Reaches 600 Wins as Duke Defeats Illinois, 4-2

1/20/2024 11:12:00 PM | Women's Tennis

Box Score Box Score (PDF)Ashworth Interview Congrats 600 Wins for Ashworth Photo Gallery

DURHAM – Duke women's tennis head coach Jamie Ashworth registered his 600th career victory Saturday evening with a 4-2 win over Illinois inside Sheffield Indoor Tennis Center. With the win Ashworth also became the quickest NCAA Division I head coach to reach 600 wins in only 747 matches over his 28 seasons with the Blue Devils.

The Blue Devils fell behind, 1-0, after dropping the doubles point, but claimed four singles wins by Shavit Kimchi, Emma Jackson, Ellie Coleman and Iuliia Bryzgalova to register the win. Duke moved to 4-0 overall, while Illinois fell to 3-1.

How It Happened

For the first time this season, the Blue Devils dropped the doubles point to open the match. All three courts were tightly contested and both teams led at one point on all three courts.
Duke opened action with a victory on court one as Shavit Kimchi and Karolina Berankova came back from being down 3-0 against Megan Heuser and McKenna Schaefbauer to win 6-4. The Blue Devils trailed, 3-0, but won three straight games to even the match, 3-3. After falling behind, 3-4, Kimchi and Berankova closed by winning three straight games to take the victory.
The Blue Devil duo of Iuliia Bryzgalova and Brianna Shvets went up against Kida Ferrari and Violeta Martinez on court three. Duke went ahead 1-0 and 2-1, but Illinois came back to take a 4-2 lead. Trailing 5-3, Bryzgalova and Shvets came back to even the score, 5-5, with a break in the previous game. Ferrari and Martinez won the next two games to win, 7-5.
The doubles point came down to court two with Duke's Emma Jackson and Ellie Coleman facing Kate Duong and Josie Frazier. Duke led 1-0 and 3-1, but Illinois came back to even the score, 3-3, winning a key deuce to win its third game. Jackson and Coleman went ahead, 4-3, and 5-4, but Duong and Frazier responded by winning three straight games to claim the win. Each of the final three games were decided by a deuce point.
Duke was able to even the match in singles as 74th-ranked Coleman defeated Kasia Treiber. Coleman, who is from Midland, Mich., fell behind 3-0 in the first set, but came back to win six out of the next seven games to win the first set, 6-4. In the second set, Coleman dropped the first game once again, but came back to win six-consecutive to take the second, 6-1.
The tie didn't last long as Illinois' Ferrari registered a 6-1, 6-4 win on court six over 78th-ranked Shvets to give the Illini a 2-1 advantage.
Duke came back once again and evened the score, 2-2, as Jackson posted a 6-3, 6-3 win on court two over Duong. In the first set, Jackson trailed 1-0 and 2-1, but came back to win 6-3. Jackson dropped the first game again, but responded by winning six straight to take the match.
The Blue Devils took their first lead of the match, 3-2, with a 6-4, 6-4 win by Duke's Bryzgalova over Schaefbauer on court five. Bryzgalova had a great start in set one taking a 3-0 lead. She led, 5-2, before Schaefbauer came back to cut the lead to 5-4. Bryzgalova closed by winning the game on serve to take the set. In the second set, Schaefbauer jumped out to a 3-0 lead, but Bryzgalova came back to go ahead, 5-4. Bryzgalova then took the set, 6-4.
On court one, Duke's 65th-ranked Kimchi and Illinois' Heuser were in a first set battle. Kimchi went ahead, 2-1, but Heuser came back to go ahead 5-3. Kimchi, who is from Israel, didn't quit and made a comeback of her own as she evened the score, 5-5. After falling behind 6-5, Kimchi once again netted a win to send the first set into a tiebreaker. Kimchi was dominate in the tiebreaker winning, 7-2. In the second set, Kimchi never trailed winning 6-2 to clinch the Duke victory.
On court four, Duke's Katie Codd dropped the first set to Martinez, but Codd won the second set, 6-4, to extend the match. The match was abandoned when Kimchi clinched the win.

Notes

The Blue Devils won their 18th consecutive home match inside Sheffield Indoor Tennis Center and moved to 101-3 all-time in the building.
Iuliia Bryzgalova posted her second straight dual match win to improve to 94-33 all-time over her career.
Junior Emma Jackson has won eight out of her last nine matches to improve to 11-7 on the season and 57-33 overall.
After dropping her first dual match of her career, freshman Shavit Kimchi has won three straight, including two match-clinching victories.
Head coach Jamie Ashworth owns 600 victories, which ranks fourth-nationally among active coaches.
Quickest to 600 Wins – 747 by Jamie Ashworth (Duke), 749 by Jeff Wallace (Georgia), 779 by Brian Kalbas (William & Mary/North Carolina) and 785 by Lin Loring (UC Santa Barbara/Indiana).
Ashworth became the seventh NCAA Division I coach to reach the 600-win ledger – Loring (846), Wallace (818), Kalbas (748), Jay Louderback (703), Geoff MacDonald (631) and Gualberto Escudero (Pepperdine).

Quotes

"You are at a great place, we are at a great school, great institution, unbelievable support staff, assistant coaches and players that we have had – yes, 600 is a great number, but there are so many people that went into all of those wins. Being at a place like Duke with the administration and support – it has been phenomenal. A great experience, a great run. It wasn't an easy one tonight either for us. I had no idea to be honest with you. Someone mentioned it to me yesterday and I had no clue. It is a tribute everybody that has been around our program during my time here. Thank you to all of them. Thank you to family and everybody else. It has been awesome to be here and be part of Duke." - Duke head coach Jamie Ashworth

"I thought it was a good college match. I don't think we played a great match. I thought with the doubles we just gave away too many opportunities. It is just little stuff that we have to clean up. Hats off to our team for competing there. They hadn't been in that situation. We were up 3-2 and we had two kids on the court – one a freshman and one that had never been in a match like that – so hats off to them. I told them after the match one of the biggest things on the whole match looking at it was Katie [Codd] winning the second set and not letting Illinois get that third point. That was big for her. Obviously, for Shavit [Kimchi] to come through in that situation was huge. We just have to get better. We have to keep improving and keep building and know that if we get into that situation, we can recover from it."

Next Match

Duke remains at home next weekend as the Blue Devils host the ITA Kickoff Weekend with 11th-ranked Auburn, Princeton and Denver. The Blue Devils face Princeton at 3 p.m., on Friday, Jan. 26 followed by Auburn against Denver and 6:30 p.m. The two winning teams will then meet on Saturday, Jan. 27 at 4 p.m., and the two non-winning teams play at 7 p.m. The winner of the championship match advances to the National Team Indoors Feb. 9-12 in Seattle, Wash.

To stay up to date with Blue Devils women's tennis, follow the team on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook by searching "DukeWTEN".

#GoDuke

#15 Duke 4, Illinois 2
January 20, 2024
Sheffield Indoor Tennis Center * Durham, N.C.

Doubles
1. Shavit Kimchi/Karolina Berankova (DU) def. Megan Heuser/McKenna Schaefbauer (ILL) 6-4
2. Kate Duong/Josie Frazier (ILL) def. Emma Jackson/Ellie Coleman (DU) 7-5
3. Kida Ferrari/Violeta Martinez (ILL) def. Iuliia Bryzgalova/Brianna Shvets (DU) 7-5

Singles
1. #65 Shavit Kimchi (DU) def. Megan Heuser (ILL) 7-6 (7-2), 6-2
2. Emma Jackson (DU) def. Kate Duong (ILL) 6-3, 6-3
3. #74 Ellie Coleman (DU) def. Kasia Treiber (ILL) 6-4, 6-1
4. #52 Katie Codd (DU) vs. Violeta Martinez (ILL) 1-6, 6-4, 0-1, unfinished
5. Iuliia Bryzgalova (DU) def. McKenna Schaefbauer (ILL) 6-4, 6-4
6. Kida Ferrari (ILL) def. #78 Brianna Shvets (DU) 6-1, 6-4

Order of Finish: Doubles (1,2,3*), Singles (3,6,2,5,1*)