NEW ORLEANS — Xavier University of Louisiana's Angela Charles-Alfred and Lailaa Bashir are responsible for the Intercollegiate Tennis Association's top moment of the 2019-20 women's season, based on fan voting on Twitter and Facebook.
     Charles-Alfred and Bashir — the NAIA and overall small-college champion at the ITA Cup tournament in October — won four consecutive fan votes, three against NCAA Division I schools. Those victories, in order:
     •  59.5 percent of the vote against Princeton's Brianna Shvets, an upset winner against Pepperdine's Ashley Lahey at ITA indoor nationals.
     •  53.8 percent against Pepperdine's Lahey, who was unbeaten in singles during the fall season.
     •  56.4 percent against North Carolina's Sara Daavettila, the fall nationals singles champion.
     •  A semifinal online decision against Hawaii Pacific, which scored an upset victory against second-ranked Columbus State at the NCAA Division II Indoor Championships. Overall totals were not available, but the XULA team captured 75.5 of the Twitter votes to overcome HPU's 51 percent on Facebook.
     "It was a great run," said Alan Green, in his 17th year as XULA's head coach — he's also director of tennis. "These contests are fun. It was amazing that the ITA considered what Angela and Lailaa accomplished to be one of the best moments of this season. For me it was surreal at every level. Each tournament had its own story, and it just kept getting better and better. I felt like I was in a movie. The sky is the limit to what these two can accomplish here at Xavier."
     Charles-Alfred and Bashir were paired against Boris Sorkin of Tufts, the men's bracket winner, for the overall ITA fan-vote championship. Sorkin, winner of back-to-back ITA Cup singles titles, won Friday with 54.7 percent during a 48-hour vote. But XULA was competitive late in the process, capturing 71 percent during the final 7 1/2 hours.