FLUSHING, N.Y. – On Sunday morning tennis finally returned to the friendly confines of the QC Tennis courts for the Queens College women's tennis team as the Knights played host to the visiting Spartans of St. Thomas Aquinas College.
 
After clinching the doubles point, the Knights lost four singles matches to be defeated to the final score of 4-3 in East Coast Conference (ECC) action. The loss moves the Knights to 1-1 in ECC action, while the Spartans improved to 4-1 in ECC play.
 
Doubles Competition
 
The Knights started the match on a high note as they swept the doubles play. The No. 1 doubles duo of Maja Makal (Bialystok, Poland) / Lovisa Engstrand (Stockholm, Sweden) put the Knights up 1-0 with another 6-1 victory over the Spartans pair of Karina Blas / Samanta Robles in back to back days.
 
The Knights No. 2 duo of Lilly Schmidt (Montabaur, Germany) / Nathalie Ulander (Stockholm, Sweden) picked up their first doubles victory of the season as they defeated the Spartans No.2 duo of Viktoriia Pavlovets / Jemima Parkinson to the score of 6-2 to give the Knights the doubles point.
 
With the Knights already leading 1-0, the No. 3 pair of Gabriela Sciarotta (Woodmere, N.Y.) / Aleksandra Caricic (New York, N.Y.) continued their undefeated streak at the No. 3 doubles slot as they defeated the duo of Dauphine Donker / Flaminia Maria Valci to the score of 6-4.
 
Singles Competition
 
Makal continued to roll at the No. 1 slot as the Poland native put the Knights up 2-0 following a two-set victory over Blas to the score of 6-1, 6-2.
 
The Spartans took the No. 4 singles match as Sciarotta fell 6-4, 6-3 to Parkinson for the second time in two days. At the No. 2 single slot Ulander would fall in a three-set thriller as she dropped the first set 6-3, but swept the second set 6-0 to take the match into the tiebreaker. But Pavlovets proved to be too much as Ulander dropped the third set to the score of 6-3 allowing the Spartans to tie the match.
 
At the No.3 singles slot, Engstrand avenged her Saturday's loss against Robles as she defeated Robles in straight set to the score of 6-3, 7-5 to regive the Knights a 3-2 lead
 
Caricic fell 7-5, 6-3 to Mulder who was promoted to the No. 5 singles slot after having played at the No. 6 slot in Saturday's match.
 
Tied 3-3, the match went into the last singles match at the No. 6 slot and to add flare a third set tiebreaker was needed to decide the match for either team. With Schmidt going up against Donker, the German native took a first set lead of 6-4 as the Knights were one set away from winning the match. But the Knights playing just their second match of the season fell to 1-1 on the season as Donker defeated Schmidt to the score of 6-3 6-3 inf the final two sets to clinch the match for the visitors.
 
An updated schedule will be provided in the upcoming days as the Knights look to see what their fate is with the ECC Women's Tennis Championship only a week away.
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