The Bucs women’s tennis team have had their struggles playing on the road this season. Their last regular season game would come against VCU.
Despite their struggles, the Bucs returned a lot of talent from last season such as Melissa Esguerra (Derrimutt, Australia) who had a 29-7 record coming into her senior season. The Bucs also returned Ioanna Markesini (Athens, Greece) who has been great for the Bucs since her freshman year.
In all, the Bucs roster is made up seniors who have had a lot of experience.
Coming into Saturday the Bucs had a 7-9 record in the regular season, whereas as their opponent VCU had a record of 11-2.
In singles play at the No. 1 spot, Markesini won both her sets 6-3.
The Bucs earned their second win when sophomore Andrea Pascual-Larrinaga (Basauri, Spain) won both her sets, dominating set one with a score of 6-1 and winning her second set 6-4.
One of the Bucs two losses on the day came in the fifth singles spot by senior Esguerra, losing a close 6-4 in set one. In the second set, her opponent just had the better day winning 6-0.
At the singles No. 2 spot senior Alory Pereira (Sao Paulo, Brazil) won both her sets winning the first set 6-4 and the second set 6-3.
The Bucs redshirt sophomore Yi Chi Ma (Kaohsiung, Taiwan) won in singles the sixth spot in three sets dominating in set one 6-0. She dropped the second set 3-6 but ultimately won the match in the third set 6-3.
The Bucs second loss came when freshman Alejandra Morales (Santiago, Chile) fell short in the first set, unable to come back from being down 7-5. In set two she won 6-3, but in the final set she loss 7-5.
The Bucs won two of their doubles matches with one of the doubles going unfinished.
The Bucs won the match 5-2, earning their eighth win of the season and handing VCU only their third loss of the season.
