Clemson’s Julie Coin Falls In NCAA Singles Final Four

May 28, 2004

ATHENS, GA – Clemson’s Julie Coin’s season came to an end on Friday as she fell in the Final Four of the NCAA Singles Tournament in Athens, GA. The junior from Amiens, France dropped a 6-1, 7-6(2) decision to defending National Champion Amber Liu of Stanford at the Dan Magill Tennis Complex on the campus of the University of Georgia. With the trip to the national semi-finals, Coin earns All-America honors in singles for the 2004 season. She is the first Clemson women’s tennis player to be named an All-American since Sophie Woorons garnered the award in 1996 for both singles and doubles.

Coin’s run to the Final Four included four victories over ranked opponents, including upsets over the second and eighth-seeded singles players in the tournament. She opened the tournament with a 6-4, 6-0 victory over #48 Sarah Foster of Kentucky in the first round and a 6-3, 6-0 win over #74 Maja Kovacek of New Mexico in the second round. In the Round of 16, Coin upset second-seeded and fifth-ranked Anda Perianu of Oklahoma (6-4, 4-6, 7-6(4)). In the quarterfinal round, she posted her second consecutive upset, defeating eighth-seeded Cristelle Grier of Northwestern in three sets (7-5, 4-6, 6-1). Coin’s loss to fourth-seeded and seventh-ranked Liu was only her sixth loss to a ranked opponent this season, with three of the six coming to top-ten ranked players.

Coin ends the season with a 32-9 overall record in singles. In posting her 32nd win over Grier on Thursday, Coin recorded the most victories by a Tiger women’s tennis player in a season since Ingelise Driehuis finished the 1987 season with 42 singles wins. She joins Woorons and former Tiger All-American and two-time Olympic Doubles Gold Medalist Gigi Fernandez as the only Clemson women’s tennis players to reach the NCAA Singles Final Four. Woorons fell in the semi-finals of the tournament in 1996, while Fernandez was the national runner up in singles in 1983.

Coin becomes the first player in Tiger women’s tennis history to reach the NCAA Final Four in both the team championship and individual singles tournament. The Clemson women’s tennis team advanced to the Final Four of the 2004 NCAA Team Championships last weekend in Athens, becoming the first women’s team in Tiger history to reach the semi-finals of an NCAA Tournament.