KNOXVILLE, Tenn. – The Lee University women's tennis team split a pair of matches at the Knoxville Racquet Club on Saturday. In back-to-back matches, the Lady Flames (2-3) beat Belmont Abbey College 6-1 then fell 4-3 to Carson-Newman University.
Carson-Newman (5-2) swept the doubles matches to take a 1-0 lead. Natasha Forrest and Hannah Price beat Ashleigh Simes and Matina Ujdur 6-1 at No. 1 doubles. Ana Carla Resende and Summer Reeves secured the doubles point with a 6-2 win over Micaela Belen-Maiz and Lisa Kirr. Violetta Khisamova and Julia Speiser completed the sweep with a 6-2 mark against Lauren Trammell and Sierra Donaldson.
Price opened singles play with a 6-2, 6-4 win at the fourth position against Ujdur. Reeves pushed the Eagles' lead to 3-0 with matching 6-4 set scores against Kirr.
Simes ended Carson-Newman's shutout hopes at No. 1 singles. Simes dropped her first set with Resende after losing the first-set tiebreaker 7-4. Simes would rebound to win the second set 7-5 and the third 10-5 in a superset format.
Belen Maiz was edged 6-4 by Khisamova in their opening set. Maiz forced a third set with a 6-3 second set margin and pulled Lee within one with a superset score of 10-4 to win the No. 3 singles match.
Anita Chornei clinched the team win with a 6-1, 6-1 defeat of Donaldson at the sixth spot. Mirjana Ragastovac won the first and third sets against Forrest to conclude the match and provide the final 4-3 margin.
"Carson-Newman is a tough team to play indoors, especially second match up," said Lee head coach Patric Hynes. "To fight and grab three singles wins was a strong effort. A split of results isn't exactly what we were after, but there's plenty of good stuff to come out of today. Two of our wins (Ash & Mica) were from a set down, so we know the fight was there. We are getting better with each match. Just need to keep believing ourselves and each other and we will work it out."
In the day's first match, Lee swept the doubles competition and won five of the six singles matches to quickly defeat the Crusaders of Belmont Abbey (2-9).
Hayden Smith teamed with Ragastovac at No. 3 doubles to beat Yaritza Gonzalez and Anna Steiner 6-1. Simes and Ujdur secured the doubles point with a 6-1 score against Daniella Galeano and Paola Socarras. Belen Maiz and Kirr completed the sweep with another 6-1 advantage over Frankee Hendricks and Hannah Farmer.
Ujdur blanked Lily Aranyos 6-0, 6-0 at No. 3 singles. Simes beat Kayla Vaughan 6-3 and 6-2 at No. 1 singles. Donaldson dropped just three points to beat Maria Lopez and clinch the team victory.
Ragastovac gave up one point in powering past Carlie Davis and Smith pushed the Lee lead to 6-0 with a 6-3, 6-0 win over Galeano.
Hendricks ended Lee's shutout bid by outlasting Belen Maiz 6-3, 7-5 at No. 2 singles.
The Lady Flames are scheduled to return to action on Wednesday against Young Harris College. The non-conference matchup is set for 2 p.m. at the DeVos Tennis Center.
