Cowichan Bay’s Grace Haugen, a freshman with the University of Montana Grizzlies tennis team, was named Big Sky Conference Player of the Week after an outstanding performance against Seattle University last weekend.
Playing in her first dual matches as a Grizzly, Haugen clinched a 4-3 win for Montana over Seattle on Sunday. She rebounded from a first-set 6-2 loss to Seattle’s Mireaia Fehr to seal the team win by taking the second and third sets 6-3 and 6-2.
Haugen also won in doubles along with her partner, senior Lauren Dunlap, to go undefeated for the day.
“This is typically a team award, so the recognition is really cool,” Montana head coach Steve Ascher said. “She had a great comeback. She lost that first set and made some great adjustments and just showed a lot of resilience to win that third set, which turned out to be the deciding point.
“It was cool because it had been kind of a crazy break where we didn’t get to play much. I think everybody’s getting their legs under them and working through a lot of different emotions. But that’s a fun way to start the year, especially for a freshman.”
This is the first Big Sky Player of the Week honour of Haugen’s career, and the first for the Grizzlies since March 2021. Haugen is the first Montana freshman to win the award since 2012.