The UNI women’s tennis team hit the road on Friday and Saturday, April 7-8. First, they had a game against the Belmont Bruins in Nashville, Tenn. They then faced the Murray State Racers in Murray, Kentucky. UNI dropped a 7-0 match against the Bruins and a tight 5-2 match against Murray State.

UNI came into the game with Belmont 5-12-1 overall, but 1-4 in conference. They did split their home stand with a win over Valparaiso just two games earlier, but it unfortunately did not provide them momentum for this matchup. It began with a bright spot for UNI, as Thaissa Moreira and Issa Sullivan dominated their doubles match enroute to a 6-0 shutout. This gave them their fourth straight win playing together. However, the other doubles matches saw UNI come up short, as both the doubles pair of Andrijana Brkic and Kim Zizek and the doubles pair of Darta Dalecka and Lorena Cardoso fell short 6-3 to cede the doubles point to Belmont. The singles matches saw UNI drop all six to give Belmont the 7-0 win overall.

UNI next moved on to face Murray State. The doubles matches did not go well, as Murray State won all three matches to get the doubles point, even snapping Moreira’s and Sullivan’s winning streak. However, several UNI Panthers performed better in the singles matches. Moreira won a tight battle in sets of 7-6 and 6-3 to give UNI a point. Kanyanut Sudsaard also picked up her third win of the year with sets of 6-2 and 6-3.

All of the other singles matches were fairly close, and the fate of the game hung in the balance until the third set of a couple of the matches. Brkic fell in sets of 6-4 and 6-3. Cardoso had a narrow loss in her first set 7-5 but then dropped the second 6-1. The other two came down to the third set. Dalecka dropped her first set 7-5, but then stormed back to tie the series with a 6-3 win. The ultimate victory went to her opponent, however, in a 6-2 third set. Finally, Zizek won her first match 7-5, but dropped the second 6-1. The final set came down to the wire, with Zizek falling by one in a 7-6 third set. This gave Murray State a 5-2 win that was much closer than the final score may indicate.

With the pair of losses, UNI falls to 5-14-1 on the season and 1-6 in MVC play. The last regular season game is against Drake in Cedar Falls on Saturday, April 15, followed by the MVC Championships from Friday through Sunday, April 21-23.