CHARLESTON, S.C. – The USC Upstate women's tennis team fell 6-1 to Charleston Southern on Saturday afternoon in the first Big South Conference match of the season.
 
"We played a really solid double match at No. 3 and had chances at No. 2 to pick up that point, just couldn't quite close out a few important points." USC Upstate head coach Tim McLane said, "Singles, we came out pretty flat as a team for about the first hour, then we finally started fighting back and playing more aggressive, and we almost turned the whole match around. We've just got to do a better job, moving forward, of starting all six matches with that kind of intensity."
 
In doubles action the Spartans faltered at the top doubles flight with a 6-1 loss. The No. 3doubles tandem of Roberta Armani and Laura Illanes evened up the score at a court a piece with a 6-4 victory over Hilda Lundstedt and Liz Williams. At the No. 2 doubles court the Spartans came close but fell 6-4 to give Charleston Southern the doubles point.
 
In singles action Roberta Armani picked up a straight sets victory at the No. 6 singles flight to put USC Upstate on the scoreboard. At the No. 1 and No. 5 singles courts, Charleston picked up a pair of wins to go up 3-1. Gabriela Cevallos and Morgan Valentine both dropped their opening sets at the No. 2 and No. 4 singles flights. In the second set both players came close to forcing a third and decisive set but fell 7-5 and 7-6 respectively. At the No. 3 singles court Maria Jardim dropped the opening set but battled back and won the second set 7-5. In the third and final set Zoe Cauthen just edged out Jardim with a 7-6 third set win.

UP next for the Spartans 
USC Upstate will host Clemson tomorrow afternoon at the USC Upstate Tennis Complex. First serve is set for 3:00 p.m.  
 
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