WACO, Texas – The No. 41-ranked University of Denver women's tennis team (11-3) dropped its match at No. 59-ranked Baylor on Tuesday night, 5-2.
 
It was the first match for Denver since March 12 and the fourth of six straight matches on the road.
 
Doubles:
Baylor took the doubles points with wins on courts 2 and 3. Denver's No. 1 doubles team of senior Britt Pursell and fifth-year student Taylor Melville traded breaks midway through their match to level things at 4-all when the match was left unfinished.
 
Singles:
BU went up 2-0 with a win over Pursell in No. 3 singles, but DU freshman Claudia Martinez de Velasco put Denver on the board with a straight-sets win in No. 6 singles. Three times in the first set, the freshman traded breaks with Baylor's Paula Baranano, the third coming with the BU player serving for the set. Martinez de Velasco dominated the tiebreak, winning it without dropping a point. The second set was on serve until Martinez de Velasco broke for a 3-2 lead before taking the next three games to claim the win.
 
Baylor sealed the win with victories in No. 5 and No. 1 singles, though the remaining two courts were played out. Sophomore Andrea Burguete Beltran gave Denver a second point on the day in a win similar to Martinez de Velasco's. She recovered from a break in the first game before breaking back to even things at 3-3. She traded breaks again and eventually forced a tiebreaker, winning it, 8-6. In the second set, she broke in her first two return games and would go on to take the set, 6-2.
 
Freshman Louise Wikander won her first set in a tiebreaker as well, 7-2, but couldn't overcome an early break of her serve in the second set to find herself in a match tiebreak in No. 4 singles. She took a 3-0 lead before BU's Liubov Kostenko got the minibreak back for 5-4. The tiebreak went back and forth with Wikander saving a match point at 7-9 down, though Kostenko would eventually win it, 12-10.
 
Up Next:
No. 41 Denver continues its Texas road trip when it plays at No. 69 SMU on Thursday, March 23, at 1 p.m. CT/12 p.m. MT. DU will play again this week when it visits Summit League opponent Western Illinois on Saturday, March 25, at 12 p.m. CT/11 a.m. MT.
 
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