The Bowling Green women’s tennis team will face a nationally ranked team this weekend when they play in Las Vegas, Nev. for their first outdoor matches since the fall season.
The Falcons take on No. 46 UNLV today at 2 p.m., then play Middle Tennessee State Sunday at 10 a.m.
The UNLV Rebels won their most recent match against UC Riverside, 6-1. They are 7-3 in dual match play for the spring season.
Middle Tennessee State (8-4) has a doubles team of Manon Kruse and Carien Venter, ranked No. 22.
The Raiders lost 5-2 to No. 4 Vanderbilt on Monday. Kruse, the team’s top singles player, ranked 55th by the ITA, lost her first singles match of the spring against Vanderbilt.
The Falcons (8-4 overall, 2-0 in the Mid-American Conference) get a two-game reprieve in Las Vegas from conference matches before heading back to the Midwest to play Eastern Michigan and Toledo next weekend.
Bowling Green will ride a three-match winning streak into Nevada, and their coach is hoping the team handles the challenges of facing nationally ranked opponents and playing their first outdoor matches of the spring.
“It’s an adjustment from indoors to out,” coach Penny Dean said. “That’s partly why we’re going out there and playing because we can count on the weather and get in a couple outdoor matches because when we get back our MAC matches are scheduled outside too, no guarantee with the weather, but we have to get ready to play outside.”
Dean said the wind and sun take time to get used to. The Falcons will also have to adjust to something that’s hard to find in Bowling Green — warm temperatures. Forecasters are predicting temperatures around 87 degrees today and 88 degrees Sunday. The Bowling Green coach added that although both opponents have been playing outside for a while already, a win for the Falcons would be huge.
“I think we have our confidence up,” Dean said. “These two teams are ranked and will be hard to play. We’re looking forward to the challenge and the opportunity. If we can beat them, that sets us up to be ranked.”
Dean will put Susie Schoenberger and Lisa Maloney at No. 1 doubles, Heidi Romer and Andrea Meister at No. 2 doubles and Cameron Benjamin and Ashley Jakupcin at No. 3 doubles.
Schoenberger will lead the Falcons at No. 1 singles, followed by Maloney, Romer and No. 3, Jakupcin at the fourth flight, Benjamin at No. 5 and Meister at the sixth flight.
