No. 33 SMU Women’s Tennis Edged At No. 9 Baylor, 4-3

WACO, Texas (SMU) – The No. 33 SMU Women’s Tennis Team fell to No. 9 Baylor on Wednesday, 4-3, at the Baylor Tennis Center in Waco. With the defeat, the Mustangs are now 12-4 this spring, while the Bears improve to 12-3.

The Mustangs grabbed the early momentum when they rallied to claim a hotly contested doubles point.

Coming off their first victory as a pair last week against Boise State in Las Vegas, Shahzoda Hatamova and Kris Roberts fought hard but ultimately fell to Taylor Ormond and Karolina Filipiak, 8-5, at No. 3.

SMU pulled even when Edyta Cieplucha and Heather Steinbauer took out Diana Nakic and Sona Navakova at the No. 2 doubles line, 8-6.

With the doubles point hanging in the balance, Marta Lesniak and Aleksandra Malyarchikova came up big to secure the decision at the No. 1 spot.

The junior duo connected on some tough shots and hung on to take out Jelena Stanivuk and Nina Secerbegovic, 9-7, to give their team the 1-0 lead.

Baylor evened things up fairly quickly once singles play began as Ormond downed Roberts 6-1, 6-1 at the No. 6 line.

The Bears then took a 2-1 lead when Nakic downed Steinbauer at No. 3, 6-3, 6-0 and moments later extended their advantage to 3-1, after Secerbegovic took out Cieplucha 6-3, 6-3 at the No. 2 singles spot.

Baylor clinched the team victory once Filipiak downed Hatamova at the No. 5 line, 6-4, 6-2.

With the match decided, the final two singles contests still in doubt played super-tiebreakers to settle their respective third sets.

Malyarcikova scored SMU’s first singles win once she regrouped to defeat Stanivuk at No. 4. The native of Belarus won the first set 6-4, before falling 6-1 in the second.

In the super-tiebreaker, Malyarchikova jumped out quickly, never looked back and won 10-7.

As expected, the match at No. 1 was very tight between Lesniak and Novakova. Two of the best singles players in the nation were the last to finish.

Lesniak, the No. 9 singles player in the county, claimed the first set 6-4, before dropping the second 6-3.

In the super-tiebreaker, Lesniak fought off multiple match points and eventually evened the score at 12-all. After a changeover, she claimed the next two points to win 14-12 and secure the third point for her team.

“I was pleased with how we came out and played doubles,” said head coach Lauren Longbotham Meisner. “We fought really hard for every point and wanted to set ourselves up be able to grab some singles points and hopefully get a win.

“But, they are a very good singles team and we were just outlasted. It was very hot and humid on the courts with very little wind and I think that affected us. I was proud of Sasha (Malyarchikova) and Marta. Even though the match was settled, they fought through the weather to win their matches. We just didn’t have enough to beat them today. Again, I am very proud and we will regroup, rest up and get focused for our match this Saturday.”

SMU returns to the courts Saturday, March 26, when they host UC Santa Barbara at the Turpin Tennis Center. The match is slated to begin at Noon.