Winona, MN - The Martin Luther College women's tennis team battled hard in a 8-1 loss to Saint Mary's on Saturday afternoon. The Knights gave it their all in the season opener and even won the No. 2 doubles match 8-7 in a back and forth affair. The pair of Rachel Schoeneck and Emily Gronholz did just enough in the tiebreaker to edge out Natalie Peterson and Elena Ruzevich of Saint Mary's. The other close doubles result for the Knights was in the No. 3 match as Charis Glende and Abigail Schewe fell 5-8.

Britney Prahl went down in her No. 2 singles match 1-6, 5-7, 7-0 to Emily Henderson, while Glende came within a point in her opening set, but ultimately lost 6-7, 3-6 in the No. 3 singles to Emily Dondelinger.

Katie Kutz (1-6, 5-7) also came close to edging out her No. 6 opponent in Kathryn Stiegel, but Saint Mary's managed to wrap up the sweep in singles play.

Despite the loss, there was a lot of positive play from the MLC women against a difficult MIAC team in Saint Mary's. The Cardinals head coach Jeff Halberg gave high praise of the Knights when he said, "I thought this was the best Martin Luther team we've faced in my 26 years."

MLC will go on to play Northwestern (Iowa) on Saturday, February 10, at 12:30 p.m. The two schools will meet on a neutral court in Owatonna, MN for that contest.