Senior Savannah Dada-Mascoll and junior Naledi Manyube traveled to Cary, North Carolina Sept. 20-28 for the Intercollegiate Tennis Association All Americas invitational. Dada-Mascoll was the only Mountaineer to qualify for the main event, going 5-1 in her six matches. 

Manyube was unable to make it out of the qualifying rounds before the main stage, losing in two straight sets. 

Dada-Mascoll went all the way to the consolation finals, taking down 5 opponents ranked in the top 51, including the ITA No. 1 in her opening match. Her performance this past week qualified her to the NCAA Championships in Orlando, Florida Nov. 18-23. 

Ranked 106th entering the event, Dada-Mascoll notched the best result of her App State career, building on last year’s NCAA Championships doubles appearance.

The opening match of the tournament for Dada-Mascoll saw her take on the ITA No. 1 DJ Bennett from Auburn University in a tough three-set match. 

She took games one and three, each with a 6-2 score line. After the win, you could see the elation of the victory, as Dada-Mascoll shouted a loud “yes.” 

Her lone loss in the event came at the hands of No. 29 Tatum Evans from the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. Dada-Mascoll lost the upper quarterfinals in 2 games to Evans with the scorelines of 6-1 and 7-5. 

After falling to Tatum, Dada-Mascoll fell into the consolation bracket where she faced off against three more top 50 opponents in three consecutive matches. The first consolation match was a tough three set match against No. 27 in the country before her final two matches each saw straight set wins for the App State senior. 

App State tennis is back in action as they head to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina for the Battle at the Beach hosted by Coastal Carolina University.