Women's

No. 3 Ohio State holds off furious Waves comeback

Daniel Susann

Daniel Susann

— 1 min read
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No. 3 Ohio State holds off furious Waves comeback
Ohio State celebrates quarterfinal win over Pepperdine in 2026 NCAA Championships in Athens, Georgia on May 15. (Daniel Susann)

ATHENS, G.A — Pepperdine fought off seven match points and made the contest interesting on all but a few singles courts. But in the end, the Waves did not claim a point versus No. 3 seed Ohio State.

Ohio State (27-4) put together an outstanding first 90 minutes of the match, but for a while, the Buckeyes just could not close out. On Court 1, No. 5 Teah Chavez gave up a 5-3 second-set lead and multiple match points in what would've been the clincher. Pepperdine's (21-5) No. 40 Ziva Faulkner played a superb match, along with a few of her teammates, but none of them could claim a point.

In the end, it was Nao Nishino to come through after dropping the first set 1-6. She stormed back to win the final two sets 6-2, 6-4.

Courts 2 and 3 were the other singles points for the Buckeyes as No. 4 Luciana Perry delivered a stellar win versus No. 46 Sonja Zhiyenbayeva and Sophia Cisse-Ignatiev took down No. 35 Anastasiia Grechkina.

The Buckeyes will face No. 2 seed Auburn tomorrow at 1 p.m.

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