DENTON, Texas – In the first conference match of the 2020 spring season, Louisiana Tech and North Texas battled for four-plus hours on the tennis courts with the Mean Green narrowly coming away with the 4-3 win over the Lady Techsters on Friday afternoon at the Waranch Tennis Complex.
 
LA Tech (6-5, 0-1 C-USA) got impressive performances up and down the lineup, coming just two games away from defeating a North Texas (6-2, 1-0 C-USA) team who has finished in the top four of the league in three of the last four years.
 
"I'm so proud of the team's effort today," said head coach Amanda Stone.  "We played lights out.  We didn't just push North Texas, we ran them down to the wire.  We had all the elements today – intensity, fight, belief – and it showed.  We had the opportunity to pull out the upset.
 
"Our doubles started the right way and even though we didn't get the point, we proved the potential we have there.  In singles, we went in knowing we had a chance on every line and today our team believed it and it showed in the scores."
 
The doubles play would be an indication of how hard-fought of a match it would be. 
 
The Mean Green got the first win of the day on court one, but Ana Jover and Claudia Oravcova made quick work of Maria Ponomareva and Nidhi Surapaneni by winning, 6-1, on court two (fourth straight victory together). 
 
The opening point came down to court three where Ilana Tetruashvili and Andrea Perez-Lopez were edged, 7-5, by Kexuan Zhou and Sophia Hummel, giving the home team the early lead. 
 
North Texas opened the singles scoring with a straight-set victory at the No. 4 spot, but then the rally began for LA Tech, starting with Perez-Lopez taking down Zhou by a final score of 6-4, 6-3 at No. 5.
 
The match then evened up at 2-2 after Nadja Manjon bested Alexandra Heczey 6-4, 6-4 at the top spot in singles. 
 
The remaining three matches on the courts went the distance by going into a third set.  Jover and Ponomareva split sets at the No. 2 position, but the Mean Green came out on top, 7-5, in the third.
 
Tetruashvili and Surapaneni split sets on the next door court at No. 3 and North Texas came away with the win in the third again to clinch the match. 
 
The remaining match was played out at No. 6 and it was Oravcova rallying after being down a set to outlast Haruka Sasaki by a score of 3-6, 7-6, 7-5.
 
"The difference came down to knowing how to close the matches when we are up," added Stone.  "That's the next step in our progress.  We are still learning that and it was a good lesson today.  I can't be more proud of our team, especially our upperclassmen who really set the tone.  If we bring this intensity into every match here on out, we will be a dangerous team."
 
The Lady Techsters will now regroup as they take on another conference opponent tomorrow in the UTEP Miners.  First serve is set at 12 p.m.
 
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