Women’s tennis team at FIU has its 10-match winning streak snapped

FIU women’s tennis closed out the week with wins over Houston and USF before dropping to Rice from this weekend in Houston. Prior to the loss, the Panthers’ win streak was 10, the longest since 2021.

FIU dominated Houston from the start.

Freshman Katerina Mandelikova and junior Salma Loudili pushed their win streak to eight at No. 3 doubles, downing Maria Dzemeshkevich and Gabriela Cortes in a 6-2 barrage.

Shortly after, sophomore Yasmine Kabbaj and freshman Oyinlomo Quadre clinched the doubles point for the Panthers, knocking out Sonya Kovalenko and Elena Trencheva for their third straight win.

Houston hoped to improve in singles play.

Loudili squashed that hope rather quickly, kicking things off with a dominant 6-0, 6-2 victory over Trencheva to give the junior standout her 11th singles win, a team high.

Kabbaj followed up with another crushing blow, dispatching Dzemeshkevich in No. 1 singles, 6-0, 6-3, to give FIU a 3-0 edge.

Quadre would ultimately spell doom for the Cougars, routing Sophie Schouten in straight sets, 6-4, 6-3, to keep the Panthers in the win column and send Houston tumbling, 4-0.

A similar fate fell to USF as FIU swatted them away in a 4-1 victory. The Bulls did manage to score a point in singles, but that was quickly overshadowed by Quadre, Mandelikova and freshman Ekaterina Khairutdinova winning three straight.

The Panthers’ fortune ended against No. 48 Rice Owls, another undefeated team in conference play.

With Kabbaj and Quadre falling at No. 2 doubles 6-4 and Mandelikova and Loudili losing at the No. 3 spot 7-6, the team came into singles down, but not out.

FIU quickly regained the lead off a pair of wins from graduate Kamila Umarova and Kabbaj, but it was short-lived as the Owls would strike back to take the lead 3-2 after Loudili fell 7-6 (7-5).

Rice’s Maria Budin put the final nail in the coffin for the Panthers, outlasting Mandelikova 7-6 (7-5) to give the Owls the win, 4-2.

Baseball

The baseball team came up short in its rematch against the Miami Hurricanes, losing 6-5 on March 28 at Alex Rodriguez Park at Mark Light Field.

The game began an hour and fifteen minutes late due to a rain delay. The game was scoreless until the third inning when redshirt sophomore Brendan Roney hammered a home run to give the Panthers a 1-0 lead.

In the bottom of the third, Miami junior CJ Kayfus scored the team’s first run after a single from junior Zach Levenson.

The fourth inning was dominated by FIU, mostly due to the efforts of redshirt senior Alec Sanchez, who hit a home run to give the team a 2-1 edge.

Later in the inning, Miami senior Dario Gomez hit a ball to left field, but Sanchez would sprint to the ball and make a jumping catch to prevent the score, halting Miami’s momentum. From that point, the game remained at 2-1 until the seventh inning.

Junior Dante Girardi kicked off the seventh with a double. A Sanchez single would score Girardi, extending the Panthers’ lead to 3-1.

JackFIU’s pitching allowed many walks through the game, but it didn’t affect them until the end. At the bottom of the seventh, junior Jack Scanlon was Miami’s first hitter of the inning and received a walk.

Kayfus would haunt FIU again when his two-run home run tied the score at 3-3.

After two hitters were walked and a bunt from Roney, FIU had runners at first and second bases. Girardi would hit a single, allowing both redshirt junior Robert Sotolongo and freshman Roylan Quevedo to score. FIU reclaimed the lead, 5-3.

The Panthers held this lead until the bottom of the ninth inning when it was Miami’s turn on offense. FIU would strike out the Hurricanes’ first two hitters, looking to close out the game.

Sophomore Edgardo Villegas walked, with FIU’s pitching doing so for the seventh time this game. Then Morales would hit a single, allowing Villegas to advance to second base.

Levenson Levenson smashed in a three-run home run, giving Miami the nail-biter win, 6-5.

Softball

The softball team concluded its week with a three-game home sweep of Texas San Antonio.

UTSA was held to just 12 hits across all three games while being outscored by the Panthers 19-3 in the series.

Game 1 was the closest-fought contest, with UTSA falling 3-1 behind stellar performances from juniors Sydney Birling and Carmen Perez.

Birling tossed her second complete game, limiting UTSA to one run and four hits in seven innings. Perez hit an run-scoring double to give FIU a crucial 2-1 lead in the second.

The second game was over quickly, with FIU uncorking a seven-run second inning to bludgeon the Roadrunners 9-1.

In the series finale, the Roadrunners struck first, scoring a run off a sacrifice fly at the top of the first inning. A great start, but that’s all it turned out to be.

FIU responded right after by rattling off four runs in the first.

Senior Frankie Izard started the offensive onslaught, taking advantage of UTSA errors to tie the score at 1-1.

Freshman Ella Whitney scored freshman Isabella Perez with a single, and an RBI from senior Madison Lewis and a sacrifice fly by freshman Makayla Navarro gave FIU a 4-1 advantage that it would never lose.

The Panthers scored three more runs in the fourth and fifth inning to end with the win, 7-1.

Brian Olmo is the Sports Director for PantherNOW, the home of FIU’s student media. William Duval is the Assistant Sports Director.

Follow Brian Olmo and William Duval on Twitter at @Brian_Olmo11 and @WillDuval40