March 16, 2012
University Park, Pa. - The No. 54 Penn State women's tennis team (8-3, 1-0) will wrap up its non-conference schedule when it hosts the Eastern Michigan Eagles (4-8, 0-0) on Saturday at noon. Weather permitting, the match will be the second match played outside at the Sarni Tennis Center. Penn State takes a great amount of momentum into the match, having won eight of its last nine matches and a 7-1 record at home this season.
Penn State last took the court on Wednesday when it defeated the Temple Owls, 4-3, in a closely contested match. The duos of Petra Januskova (Ottawa, Canada) / Chelsea Utting (Peachtree City, Ga.) and Nina Sertic (Zagrab, Croatia) / Marie-Frederique Bedard (Montreal, Canada) each won their doubles matches to take the first point for the Nittany Lions. No. 55 ranked Januskova, Utting and Sertic also won their respective singles matches to earn the victory for Penn State.
Eastern Michigan is led by Head Coach Ryan Ray, who was been at the helm of the Eagles program for six seasons. Nino Mebuke has been dominant in the No. 1 and 2 singles slot this season, compiling a 5-2 record, including a four match win streak. Penn State is 2-0 all-time against Eastern Michigan. The Nittany Lions last beat the Eagles in the spring of 2001 and their only other match came in the spring of 1991.
Next up, Penn State enters the conference portion of its schedule for the rest of the season. The Nittany Lions will only face Big Ten opponents for the remainder of the spring. Penn State hosts Indiana on Friday, March 23 at 4 p.m. and Purdue on Sunday, March 25 at 11:30 a.m. After that the Nittany Lions will hit the road for the first time in over a month and a half, when it travels to Iowa to take on Hawkeyes on Friday, March 30 at 5 p.m.
All of the Nittany Lions home matches can be followed through the link for live stats at http://www.gopsusports.com/livestats/c-tennis/xlive.htm. Make sure to "like" the Penn State Women's Tennis page on Facebook and follow @PSUWomensTennis on Twitter!