Hawaii tennis, water polo players receive All-America honors

The Hawaii women’s tennis and water polo programs received some heady individual recognition over the last few days.

Water polo players Irene Gonzalez and Elyse Lemay-Lavoie were named All-Americans, as was UH tennis star Petra Melounova.

Gonzalez, a first-teamer, and Lemay-Lavoie, a second-teamer, helped the Rainbow Wahine to the Big West championship and the program’s first NCAA tournament appearance since 2015. For Gonzalez, a two-time Big West player of the year and a senior who scored 60 goals this season, the first-team honors are a repeat award. The native of Spain earned some form of ACWPC All-America honors all four seasons in Manoa. She departs the program as its all-time leader in goals per match (2.31) and as its third-leading scorer overall with 226.

Lemay-Lavoie, a junior from Canada, picked up second-team All-America honors after scoring 53 goals and setting a new program record for shooting percentage at .663. It was her first career All-America honor.

Melounova, the first ITA All-American in UH men’s or women’s tennis history, has been the Big West player of the year in all three of her seasons at UH and has made three straight NCAA tournaments, setting another program firest. The Czech Republic native won two matches in the NCAA women’s singles tournament in Orlando, Fla., last month to reach the round of 16. She is the only Wahine player to date to win one or more matches in the NCAAs.

In tennis, any player to reach the round of 16 is an automatic All-American, as are players seeded in the top 16 who do not make it that far.

Melounova defeated five ranked players during the season and finished at 15-5 in singles.