Chambana Sun

The Fighting Illini women's tennis team faced a challenging match against Iowa on Friday at the Atkins Tennis Center in Urbana, Illinois. Despite taking an early lead by securing the doubles point, Illinois was unable to maintain their advantage, ultimately falling to No. 49 Iowa with a final score of 4-1.

With this result, Illinois now holds a season record of 6-8 and is 1-2 in Big Ten play. Meanwhile, Iowa improved its overall record to 8-4 and stands at 2-1 in conference action.

Illinois began the match strong by winning the doubles point for the eighth time this season. The sequence of matches saw Iowa secure victory at No. 1 doubles before Illinois' Alice Xu and Violeta Martinez triumphed at No. 2 doubles with a decisive 6-1 win. Following them, McKenna Schaefbauer and Kasia Treiber clinched the opening point for Illinois with a comeback win at No. 3 doubles, finishing 6-4 after trailing earlier in the set.

However, Iowa responded effectively on the singles courts by winning four consecutive matches at positions No. 4, 1, 6, and 3 to claim overall victory.

The final scores for the singles matches were as follows: Tereza Dejnozkova from Iowa defeated McKenna Schaefbauer; Marisa Schmidt from Iowa overcame Violeta Martinez; Barbora Pokrvna secured her win against Ariel Madatali; and Nikita Vishwase won over Kasia Treiber.

The next opportunity for Illinois to improve their standing will be on Sunday when they face No. 58 Nebraska at home in another Big Ten matchup scheduled for noon.