DeLand, Fla. ? The Stetson women's tennis team (5-6, 4-1 Atlantic Sun) suffered its first conference loss of the season Saturday morning, narrowly falling 4-3 to defending A-Sun champs Jacksonville (6-3, 3-0 A-Sun) at the Mandy Stoll Tennis Center.
Freshman Megan Jones (Miramar, Fla.) and sophomore Katherine Nowicki (Jacksonville, Fla.) won singles matches while Nowicki also teamed with sophomore Breanna Atkinson (Bradenton, Fla.) to win at #2 doubles.
Sophomore Valentina Galbarini (Montevideo, Uruguay) and freshman Unnati Purushotham (Hyderabad, India) won their doubles match at the #1 position, rolling to an 8-2 victory over Tatiana Soldotova and Iva Jaresova.
The match was split 3-3 after the first five singles matches and would be decided by the #1 matchup. Galbarini and her Dolphin foe Lina Xu split the first two sets but Xu disappointed Stetson by taking the final set 6-3 and winning the match for Jacksonville.
“This match was a heartbreaker to lose, but hopefully we can build on it for the rest of the season,” said Head Coach Sasha Schmid.
The Hatters are back in action Monday afternoon at 2:30 p.m. for a home match against non-conference foe Northern Illinois at the Mandy Stoll Tennis Center.
