March 9, 2015

Results

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SPRINGFIELD - Anelisse Torrico Moreno won her eighth straight singles match and Miranda Poile picked up her fifth victory of the season as the Missouri State women's tennis team dropped a close 5-2 dual to IPFW on Monday, March 9, at Cooper Tennis Complex.

"It was a good match out there today," Bears head coach Mallory Weber said. "We were really happy to play outside because it was our first outdoor matches since we were in Columbia early in the season. We had a pretty good crowd and a lot of close matches. Unfortunately they (IPFW) were a little bit tougher today and they closed them out, and we need to keep putting ourselves in those situations and get better at them."

The Bears (3-7) were led at No. 4 and No. 5 singles by Torrico Moreno and Poile.

Torrico Moreno improved her singles match-winning streak to eight by defeating IPFW's Sofia Sorokina in straight sets. The pair went to a first-set tiebreaker with Torrico Moreno taking advantage in the extra game 7-3, then finished off the dual with a second-set 6-4 win.

Poile improved her singles record this spring to 5-4 by completing a comeback. After falling in the first set 4-6 to Sara Sherif, Poile rattled off 6-2, 6-1, set victories for MSU's first point of the dual.

Despite dropping the remaining singles matchups, the Bears were competitive in several singles slots.

MSU's Ekaterina Donetskova went to a third-set match tiebreaker against the Mastodons' Alina Schibol, but eventually fell 7-5, 5-7, 12-10 at No. 2 singles. Ema Turudija held a lead in the No. 1 singles position before losing to Mayu Sato 7-5, 6-2, and Bears freshman Abbey Belote dropped her first set at No. 6 singles, but battled to fall in her final set to Marcy Huck 6-4.

"We have so many away matches this year, so that any time we can play here (in Springfield) it is helpful for us," Weber said. "I think it definitely helped us today playing at home and was part of the reason why we kept it so close in a lot of our matches."

IPFW (12-5) won doubles matches at the No. 1 and No. 3 positions to clinch the opening point. The Bears' No. 2 duo of Donetskova/Torrico Moreno were up 5-3 before their match was left unfinished.

"We have to bounce back so quickly because in two days we're playing and it's nonstop for three days," Weber said. "They're excited for it, it's spring break, we get to go somewhere warm. We have some really tough matches and really good competition and hopefully we continue to get better and get ready for conference."

MSU travels to Texas next for three matches in three consecutive days. The Bears will open their three-match swing with a 4 p.m. dual at Texas State on Wednesday, March 11, play Texas-San Antonio at 11 a.m. Thursday and take on Texas-Pan American in a neutral-site dual in San Antonio at 9 a.m. Friday.