March 2, 2008

Lute Women Netters Drop Two Matches East of Mountains

Whitworth 5, PLU 4
Whitman 8, PLU 1

Pacific Lutheran dropped a pair of Northwest Conference women's tennis matches this weekend east of the mountains. Yesterday afternoon in Spokane, Whitworth defeated the Lutes, 5-4. Today, the Whitman Missionaries knocked off Pacific Lutheran, 8-1.

With the defeats, Pacific Lutheran falls to 3-3 overall and also 3-3 in conference matches.

Against Whitworth, the Lutes started out by taking two of the three doubles points. Erika Feltus and Ashley Coats defeated Lexy Harrington and Linh Aven at No. 1 doubles, 8-3, and Liz Currey and Emily Starr pulled out a win over Rachel Burns and Taryn Smith at No. 2, 9-8 (8-6). Whitworth rallied to win four of the six singles matches to take the 5-4 team victory.

Winning singles matches for the Lutes were Currey at No. 2 and Starr at No. 5. Currey defeated Harrington 6-3, 6-4, and Starr beat Smith, 7-5, 6-0. In the pivotal No. 1 singles match, Burns and Feltus battled before the Whitworth player won 6-3, 3-6, 6-3.

Coats picked up the Lutes' lone point against Whitman, defeating Margo Lentz, 6-1, 6-3, at No. 3 singles. PLU came close in the first two singles matches, losing both in three sets. At No. 1, Elise Otto rallied to beat Erika Feltus, 2-6, 6-4, 6-3, while at No. 2 it was Hadley DeBree knocking off PLU's Liz Currey, 6-2, 2-6, 6-3.

The Lutes return to action next Friday, March 7, when they host six-time defending conference champion Linfield at 3:30 p.m. on the PLU courts. The following day, the Lutes will play a "doubleheader" against Pacific, hosting the Boxers in two matches that are scheduled to start at 11 a.m. and 3:30 p.m.

- PLU -