EDINBURG, Texas – In their first match of the spring, the Texas A&M-Kingsville tennis team suffered a 7-0 setback at the hands of the UT Rio Grande Valley Vaqueros in Edinburg, Texas on Sunday evening.
The Vaqueros took the first point of the day in doubles competition, winning all three matches that were completed. The best showings for the Javelinas on the doubles side came from the tandems of Laura Montalvo and Stephanie Baerman and Victoria Romanovskaia and Valerie Ruiz. Montalvo and Baerman went toe-to-toe with UTRGV's Doris Alekovksa and Anastasia Belyaeva before falling 6-4. Romanovskaia and Ruiz, the South Central's seventh-best doubles team, were facing a narrow, 5-4 deficit against Marine Darzyan and Dominique Ibarra, but, with Vaqueros taking the other three doubles matches, this one was left unfinished.
In singles, Phonephathep Philavong was the only member of the squad to take a set, besting Dominique Fuster in the opening competition, but Fuster would come back to win, 4-6, 6-3, 10-6. Julia Rauer hung tough in her first battle with Belyaeva, but fell by scores of 7-5 and 6-0 and Montalvo nearly stole the second set from Lasya Patnaik, but ended up suffering a defeat, 6-2, 7-6(7).
Thursday's date with Texas A&M-Corpus Christi is up next for the Javelinas. The scheduled start time is 4 p.m. at the Thomas J. Henry Tennis Center. Receive content for Texas A&M-Kingsville tennis by following @JavelinaTennis on Twitter and Instagram, liking the official Facebook page of Javelina Athletics (/JavelinaSports), and subscribing to the JavelinaAthletics YouTube channel.
