CHARLESTON, W. Va. - The Slippery Rock University women's tennis team lost to Mercyhurst University, 4-2, in the first round of the 2019 NCAA Tournament Monday at the Charleston YMCA in Charleston, West Virginia.
 
Monday's match was originally set to be played outdoors at the Schoenbaum Tennis Courts in Charleston, West Virginia, but inclement weather forced the match to be played indoors.
 
Slippery Rock ends the season with a 16-9 record. The 16 wins were the most victories in a single-season for The Rock since the 2009 campaign.
 
SRU took the doubles point from the Lakers with wins from the second and third flights, but Mercyhurst went on to record four wins in singles competition to capture the tournament-victory. The Lakers improve to 18-7 with the win and will play West Virginia State University 11 a.m. Tuesday in second-round action.
 
Kayla Forst and Sangeeta Roopan outlasted Viola Lugmayr and Lois Page in the top doubles flight to start the match, but Lauren Fadden and Allie Welch gave The Rock life with a 7-5 third-flight victory over Athina Tsagkaraki and Hannah Wenzel to keep SRU alive to win the doubles point with the second flight yet to be completed.
 
For the second time in as many matches Olivia Warner and Lacey Cohen were able to beat the Lakers' No. 2 team of Ivona Plecevic and Naomi Jahr, 7-5, and in the process give The Rock the first point of the day heading into singles action.
 
However, Tsagkaraki proceeded to record Mercyhurst's first point of the contest when she defeated Warner 6-2, 6-0 in the fourth flight to begin the singles portion of Monday's match.
 
Slippery Rock briefly retook the lead at 2-1 following a 6-1, 6-3 victory by Fadden against Jahr in the fifth flight, but the Lakers were able to close out the match with three straight wins.
 
Pecevic first downed Page in the third flight 7-5, 6-3 followed by Frost narrowly edging Cohen 6-4, 7-6 (5) in the top flight to give Mercyhurst a 3-2 advantage with two singles bouts remaining.
 
After dropping the first set to Roopan 6-2, Lugmayr battled back in the second to force a tiebreaker but, ultimately came up just short 7-6 (3) in the match-deciding point. The sixth flight contest between Welch and Wenzel, which was started late due to there only being five available courts, was halted once Roopan defeated Lugmayr.
 
The Rock's entire roster finished the season with individual winning percentages of .500 or better with Fadden (17-8) leading the way at .680 followed by Warner (19-10 / .655), Page (19-12 / .613), Cohen (17-14 / .548), Lugmayr (15-13 / .536) and Welch (12-12 / .500), who was playing in her final collegiate match Monday. Amy Varckette also went 6-3 (.667) in limited action.
 
The Rock's primary doubles teams saw Lugmayr and Page go 18-9 with Cohen and Warner close behind at 17-6.
 
Slippery Rock will likely contend for its third straight NCAA Tournament next year as SRU returns six of its seven student-athletes from this year's roster next season.
 
 


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