SAINT LEO, Fla. - The Slippery Rock University women's tennis team lost a non-conference road match at No. 34 Saint Leo University, 5-2, Wednesday.
The Rock's setback against the nationally ranked Lions drops their record to 3-5 overall in 2024-25 while host Saint Leo improves to 9-1.
Saint Leo opened Wednesday's match with a sweep of the doubles flights to take the first team point.
From the first flight, Luzia Obermeier and Kamilya Shailina defeated
Alissia Kivi and
Nicole Kempton, 6-3.
The second flight was a close contest that went to the Lions, 6-4, as Camila Keller and Caludia Roca edged
Amaia Balaguer Brau and
Tina Slovak.
The third flight match between the Lions and The Rock was another tight showdown which went to a tiebreaker that ultimately led to a 7-6 (7-2) win for Catherine Rabatin and Madelyn Martin over
Dari Sakhanova and
Georgie Lancaster. Rabatin and Martin entered the match as the 18th ranked doubles team in Division II.
While SRU was swept in doubles play, it was able to avoid the sweep with a pair of singles victories. The highlight of the day for The Rock came out of the first and fifth flights where Balaguer Brau and Sakhanova each earned wins.
Balaguer Brau, the 21st ranked singles athlete in the country, gained a 6-3, 6-4 win over Roca to improve her record to 13-7. She has now won three of her last four matches.
Sakhanova meanwhile pushed her record to 10-6 on the year courtesy of a hard fought 6-3, 4-6, 10-3 triumph over Rabatin. Like Balaguer Brau, Sakhanova has also come away victorious in three of her last four outings.
Kempton nearly gave SRU its third point of the match in a narrow loss to Shailina from the third flight 6-1, 6-7 (12-10), 10-2.
The remainder of the match consisted of Saint Leo wins from the second flight (Obermeier over Kivi 6-2, 6-3), the fourth flight (No. 56 Keller over Slovak 6-1, 6-0) and the sixth flight (Martin over Lancaster 6-3, 6-3).
Slippery Rock concludes its Florida trip with another ranked match 3 p.m. Friday at No. 31 Florida Southern.
To stay up to date with all that happens at The Rock, follow our official athletic communication accounts on 'X' (formerly Twitter, @Rock_Athletics), Facebook (RockAthletics) and Instagram (RockAthletics).
