The Tribune

By BRENT STUBBS

Senior Sports Reporter

bstubbs@tribunemedia.net

SENIOR Sydney Clarke and the University of Alabama at Birmingham kicked off their Blazers’ collegiate women’s tennis season in grand style last week, winning the Austin Peay Fall Tournament in Clarkesville, Tennessee.

The three-day event included teams from Clarkesville, Southeast Missouri, Murray State, Cumberland and Chattanooga.

In singles, the Blazers went 5-1 against Southeast Missouri, 4-2 against Austin Peay and 3-3 against Murray State. The Blazers were 12-6 overall in singles.

Clarke then teamed up with Mackenzie White to post a perfect 3-0 record and was joined by the rest of their team-mates as they won all nine of their matches against Southeast Missouri, Austin Peay and Murray State.

Nine different combinations were used for the nine doubles matches. Individually, Clarke, Mellynchuk, Wasserbauerova, Ratkic, White, and Smith each recorded three wins.

“I’m very proud of myself. I feel like the work that I put in over the summer is showing up in my results,” Clarke said. “So I’m really glad and I think our practices so far for the fall have really been intense.

“Everyone has really been pushing each other so I think that has really helped. That’s why we had a great start to the fall season.”

Over the summer, Clarke got a chance to once again represent the Bahamas at the Fed Cup. While the team didn’t get promoted to Zone II, Clarke said the experience has helped her to get ready for her final collegiate season.

Clarke and the Blazers will be back in action this weekend as they head to Baton Rouge, Louisiana for the ITA Southern Regionals. The four-day event begins October 5 and runs through October 9.

“I just hope to continue to make slight improvements to my game and work towards the spring season, which will start in January,” she said. “But I believe the work that we are putting in on and off the court has been really well and we’ve changed a lot of things that we did in the past.

“That has helped us to get a lot of wins, so I feel very confident in us having a great season next year.”

Clarke, who turns 22 on November 18, is the daughter of Shayvon and Bernard Clarke. She has a younger sister Sarai Clarke, who is following her footsteps in high school in the United States.

The two teamed up to play doubles for the first time at the sixth Bahamas Games where they helped the Andros Chickcharnies to win the gold in tennis.

Clarke, a former junior national champion student of CR Walker who graduated from Windsor Academy, is studying entrepreneurship at UAB.