Lady Paladins come on strong, winning two of three in west coast tournament

After a rather long break, the Furman Women's Tennis team got back into the action of winning this past month as they took on three non-conference opponents and began their first conference games against Samford and Chattanooga at home. The team traveled over 2,000 miles to San Diego, Calif. to take part in the USD Invitational to take on San Diego, Portland and San Francisco in a weeklong tournament. Although the team was defeated in its first match against #50 San Diego, they fought back in the next matches to notch two more wins for the season. The match against Portland was a rather easy 7-0 victory for the Lady Paladins, but the game against San Francisco proved to be much more challenging.

Going into the match against the University of San Francisco, senior Laura Gioia (currently ranked 12th in the nation) held a six-match winning streak and was 6-3 on the season. In a big upset, USF sophomore Jennifer-Lee Heinser defeated the star tennis player 7-6 (1), 6-2. USF and Furman ended up splitting sets, and the match came down to the face-off between senior Lauren Tomory and USF's Cecilia Gratian. Tomory, despite all the pressure, pulled off a stunning victory over Gratian with a score of 6-4, 5-7, 6-1, which sealed the victory for Furman. It was the fifth straight win of the season for the Vincenzo, Italy native.

Following her performance against USF, Tomory (7-4 on the season) was named the Southern Conference Women's Tennis Player of the week, becoming the third Paladin to garner the title this season. While Tomory was busy earning SoCon Player of the Week honors, Gioia won the title of SoCon Women's Tennis Player of the Month for the month of February. Gioia has distinguished herself as a top athlete in the nation, as she has recorded victories against numerous ranked opponents this season. These recent honors and their stellar performance at the USD Invitational put the Lady Paladins in a good position for their opening weekend of conference play last weekend.

The team's first SoCon game of the season came against Samford, the most recent addition to the conference. In front of a home crowd, the Lady Paladins downed Samford easily with a 7-0 shutout. Senior Lauren Tomory only gave up one game on the day as she defeated Beth Erwin 6-1, 6-0.

Following their first conference win of the season, the women were set to take on their next SoCon opponent, Chattanooga. Once again, the ladies pulled off a 7-0 shutout, thereby extending their regular season SoCon winning streak to 90 matches (the team also holds a record of 8 consecutive conference titles). During the win over Chattanooga, Jessica Preeg and Jennifer Betts both notched another win, Laura Gioia extended her record to 8-4, Tomory's record improved to a team leading 9-4, freshman Susan won her fourth straight match and sophomore Monica Arguello extended her streak to seven straight victories.

The team hosted Western Carolina this past Wednesday. This match was too late for press.