The Prairie Fire battled hard but came out on the wrong end of a 9-0 score in the season opener against highly regarded Lawrence University Saturday on the Knox campus.
The match was also the first for new Fire women's tennis coach Jared Katchen, a former successful men's tennis player at Knox.
The Vikings return Elizabeth Larson, Jennifer Roesch, and Carla Schmidt this season, three formidable players at #1, #2 and #4 singles, respectively, last season.
Larson advanced to the #1 singles title match at the 2010 Midwest Conference Championships in Madison, Wisconsin. She lost to Lake Forest College’s Melika Celebic (7-5, 6-4).
Roesch fell in the semifinal round of last year's conference championships to eventual #2 singles winner Constanza Alarcon of Grinnell College while Schmidt was the runner-up at #4 singles after she dropped a three-set match against champion Morgan Counts of Grinnell.
The team of Larson and Roesch won the #1 doubles title last year and Schmidt was part of a duo that advanced to the semifinals at #2 doubles.
Needless to say, opening the new season against the Vikings was a challenge, and one that the Prairie Fire welcomed.
Larson defeated sophomore Dana Pierce (South Barrington, Illinois) 6-2, 6-2 in the #1 singles match. Roesch won by the same score against senior Megan Funk (Springfield, Missouri) at #2 singles. Gayatri Malhotra downed senior Jordan Kuban (Greeley, Colorado) 6-2, 6-1 in the #3 singles match, Christina Schaupp defeated sophomore Charlotte Garvin (Omaha, Nebraska) 6-0, 6-2 at #4 singles, Hannah Geoffrey beat senior Katie Beadling (Portage, Michigan) 6-1, 6-1 in the #5 singles match-up, and Polly Dalton got past junior Emily Tyl -- the consolation champ at #6 singles in Madison when she knocked off LU's Elizabeth Byers (10-8) -- 6-1, 6-3.
The #2 doubles team of Kuban and Beadling played the closest match of the day, falling 8-6 to Lawrence's Schmidt and Dalton.
The Vikings won the #1 (Pierce and Funk vs. Larson and Roesch) and #3 (Garvin and Tyl vs. Schaupp and Geoffrey) doubles matches 8-0 and 8-1.
Lawrence also won 9-0 at Monmouth College earlier in the day to improve to 3-0 on the young season.
Next up for Knox (0-1) is a dual against defending MWC champion and 2011 league favorite Grinnell College (2-0) in the MWC South Division opener for both schools. The Prairie Fire and the Pioneers are scheduled to play Saturday, September 10 in Grinnell. The start time for the match is at 11:00 a.m.
The Pioneers have posted wins of 5-4 against Illinois Wesleyan and 6-1 against Augustana College so far this season. Both matches were played August 27 in Rock Island, Illinois.
