Southern Illinoise University Athletics
Southern Illinois Women's Tennis Splits Friday's Doubleheader
03/04/2011 | 12:00:00 | Women's Tennis
March 4, 2011
By: Cameron Krones
Carbondale, Ill. The Southern Illinois women's tennis team split Friday's doubleheader by losing to St. Louis 4-2 and defeating Austin Peay 4-3.
The Salukis started off the day with a fast start as they took two of three doubles matches behind the strong play of partners Melanie Delsart and Jennifer Dien and Korey Love and Anastacia Simons to take an early match lead 1-0.
As soon as singles play started, St. Louis regained it's poise as they would win four out of the six singles matches only surrendering one match to Southern Illinois's Melanie Delsart to dominated St. Louis's Hailee Elmore (6-3, 6-2) The Billikens would end up taking the match with a match final 4-2.
After a quick break, the Salukis went back to work, only this time it was Austin Peay, who had two players ranked in the pre-season top 125 single players: Vanja Tomic (123) and Carolin Weikard (125).
The Salukis started off the same way they did against St. Louis as they took two out of the three doubles matches and took and early 1-0 lead. However, unlike the first match, the Salukis would tke the first two matches with wins by Melanie Delsart and Anita Lee.
Delsart's win was over Vanja Tomic (6-1, 6-2), the 123 ranked singles player pre-season was a big confidence win for because she lost to Vanja last year," said head coach Audra Nothwehr."
Anita Lee defeated Carolin Weikard ranked number 125 in the pre-seaon pole for single players (7-5, 2-6, 6-3.) Audra Nothwehr said of the victory, Anita played a very tough match today and she did a great job of overcoming the second set loss and regaining her composure to get the win over a very talented player."
Coach Nothwehr's said of her teams overal performance on the day, "Our doubles played amazing today. The went out and took control of the matches and got out team of to a good start. Singles struggled at times, but having a doubleheader and playing for nearly twelve hours, players get tired and it happens."
The Salukis improved to 6-4 on the season and Melanie Delsart with her two wins today, improved her singles winning streak to six games.
The Salukis will travel to Arkansas State next week and look to continue their excellent play and hope to put another winning streak alive.
Players Mentioned
