The weekend may not have gone the way the Clemson women’s tennis team would have liked, but there was one positive the 23^rd-ranked Tigers took away despite losses to No. 3 Duke on Friday and No. 8 North Carolina Sunday.

Freshman Beatrice Gumulya, who plays No. 4 singles for Clemson, won both of her matches this weekend, capping it with a hard-fought 6-4, 5-7, 6-1 victory over UNC’s Gina Suarez-Malaguti Sunday at the Hoke Sloan Tennis Center in Clemson.  The win improved Gumulya’s record to 6-1 against ACC competition, which includes a victory over Duke’s Rachel Kahan, who was 15-0 in her ACC career before Gumulya took her down.

“When I come into a match, I don’t think about winning or losing,” the Jakarta, Indonesia native said. “I’m going to do my best. I know their ranking is good, but basically I just focus and try not to play tight.”

Basically, Gumulya stays loose. There was no better evidence of that than in Friday’s 6-4, 6-1 win over Kahan. Despite Kahan’s impressive resume, which includes a 31-1 record as a freshman and an eight-match winning streak prior to Friday, the Clemson freshman was not intimidated as she recorded an easy two-set victory.

It turned out to be the Tigers only victory against the Blue Devils, and was Gumulya’s first win against a ranked player. Kahan is ranked 86^th nationally.

“I don’t think about rankings or anything like that,” she said. “Actually, it’s fine I don’t know who I’m playing against. It’s the same thing for them. They had never played against me before. It basically comes down to whoever was ready or played the best.”

No one seems to be playing better than Gumulya these days. The freshman is finally catching her groove after a slow start to the season as she has adjusted to being in a new country, while also adjusting to life as a college student.

Before coming to Clemson, Gumulya ranked 755^th in the International Tennis Federation (ITF) rankings, and was ranked 22^nd on the junior circuit. As a doubles player, she reached the finals of the Juniors 2008 U.S. Open and the 2009 Australian Open.

“She was a great World Class Junior coming into the program,” Clemson head coach Nancy Harris said. “Early in the spring, we had to play her higher because we had a couple of people out of the lineup so she kind of got beat up a little bit there, and took some losses.

“Obviously, we had to move her back down and give her a chance to give her a little breather, but I think she is starting to feel her stride again. She is probably one of the ones that will climb back up in the lineup again. Who knows what we will do next? But we definitely want to reward her with the opportunity to maybe step up again.”

Gumulya says she is having fun. She likes playing on a team, a role she once played on when she played on the Indonesia team as a junior player when she was 13 and 14-years old.

“I like to play with a team,” she said. “It’s not only all about me. It’s about everybody. Even though I won my match, the team lost today. That’s not a good thing. I want us to win as a team, too. That’s when it is really fun.”

Prior to this weekend, the Tigers were having a lot of fun when it came to winning. Clemson had won four straight ACC matches, including victories over Georgia Tech and Florida State.

“It has been fun playing with them,” Gumulya said. “When you are part of a team, you care about that other person on the court next to you. When they score a point or make a really big shot, you can cheer for them and encourage them to keep going.

“That’s not something you can do as an individual player. This is so much more fun.”

–Will Vandervort

In individual sports with multiple major championship events, coaches often talk about making sure that athletes compete in cycles. Training programs are designed to produce peak performances at key times. Falling behind schedule at any point could affect team success in sports like swimming and track and field.

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