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Top Seeds Advance To Title Match Showdowns

CHAMPIONSHIP CENTRAL

WACO, Texas - The Baylor and Oklahoma men and the Baylor and Texas Tech women advanced to the 2015 Big 12 Tennis Championship title matches with victories on Saturday at Hurd Tennis Center.
 
The title matches will be available live on FOX Sports 2 in a broadcast window that runs from 12-6 p.m. CT, with the men’s match being played first. If the action runs beyond the 6 p.m. window, the remainder can be found on FOX Sports GO, where the event will also be streamed live in its entirety.
 
The men’s semifinal action featured four top 10 teams as No. 1 Oklahoma was pitted against No. 10 Texas, and No. 2 Baylor faced No. 6 TCU. The competition lived up to its billing, with both courts knotted at 3-3, and coming down to tiebreaker in the decisive matches.
 
Oklahoma (23-2) took the doubles point to go up 1-0 with a pair of 6-4 victories from its No. 1 and No. 2 doubles teams. The Longhorns came out firing in singles, taking the first two decisions with a 6-3, 7-5 win for Adrien Berkowicz over Dane Webb and a 6-2, 6-4 win for Clement Homs against Florin Bragusi.

The Sooners responded as their No. 1 (Axel Alvarez Llamas) and No. 2 (Andrew Harris) singles players rallied for wins as a UT victory at No. 5 singles made the match 3-3. No. 4 singles between OU’s Alex Ghilea and UT’s George Goldhoff was a back-and-forth affair, with Ghilea clinching the match for the Sooners in a 2-6, 6-3, 7-6 (3) victory.

Similarly, No. 3 TCU was able to rally from a 3-1 deficit after Baylor took the doubles point and got straight-set singles victories from Diego Galeano and Felipe Rios at No. 4 and No. 6, respectively. The Horned Frogs knotted the match at 3-3 after a win from Arnau Dachs (6-1, 7-6) and Guillermo Nunez (3-6, 7-6, 6-0). However, the No. 1 ranked singles player in the country put the match away for Baylor, as Julien Lenz took down TCU's Nick Chappell in tiebreaker (6-1, 5-7, 7-6).

Sunday will mark the fourth-consecutive year that Oklahoma and Baylor have met in the title match of the Big 12 Championship. The Sooners took home the crown in 2012 and 2013, while Baylor won the 2014 conference title match.
 
On the women’s side, No. 1 Baylor took down in-state rival No. 3 TCU, 4-0. After taking the doubles point, the Bears showed why they’re ranked No. 8 in the country, with three straight-set singles wins to put the match away.

Kelley Anderson quickly put the Bears up 2-0 on a 6-1, 6-2 win over Seda Arantekin at No. 6 singles. No. 5 Theresa Van Zyl put the Bears on the brink of a Big 12 title match birth with a 6-4, 6-4 win over Alexis Pereira, and Blair Shankle slammed the door shut with a 6-2, 6-2 decision over Sofiko Kadzhaya.
 
The second-seeded Texas Tech women put themselves one step closer to the first Big 12 Championship title in school history with a 4-1 victory by Oklahoma State. Following a pair of 7-5 doubles victories by the No. 1 and No. 2 Red Raider pairings, Texas Tech rolled the momentum into singles.

Gabriella Talaba started things off by taking down Katarina Adamovic 6-1, 6-2 at No. 2 singles. The Red Raiders would also get victories from No. 3 Sarah Dvorak and No. 4 Lynn Kiro to wrap up a bid in the title match.
 
Sunday’s title matches will begin with men's action at noon on Sunday from Hurd Tennis Center. The women’s match will start 30 minutes after the conclusion of the men’s match.
 
2015 Big 12 Men’s Tennis Championship – Semifinals
No. 1 Oklahoma def. No. 4 Texas, 4-3
No. 2 Baylor def. No. 3 TCU, 4-3
 
2015 Big 12 Women’s Tennis Championship – Semifinals
No. 1 Baylor def. No. 4 TCU, 4-0
No. 2 Texas Tech def. No. 3 Oklahoma State, 4-1