CHARLOTTE, N.C. – The No. 47-ranked University of Denver women's tennis team (11-5, 3-0 Summit) lost a heartbreaker at No. 52 Charlotte, 4-3, on Friday afternoon.
 
After the match was moved indoors and started an hour earlier than originally scheduled, DU claimed the doubles point and went on to lead 3-1 before the 49ers rallied for a third-set win in the final singles match of the day.
 
Doubles:
DU took the first point of the day with wins at Nos. 1 and 3 doubles after all three matches were knotted up at 3-3. Graduate student Britt Pursell and junior Andrea Burguete Beltran broke for a 5-3 lead and held serve to take down the No. 37-ranked team in the country.

Charlotte evened up the doubles scoreboard with a late break in the No. 2 match-up, leaving the No. 3 match to determine who would take the doubles point. Sophomore Claudia Martinez de Velasco and Alice Otis recovered a from a breakdown to win four of the final five games in the match, breaking in the 6-5 game to put Denver up 1-0 overall.
 
Singles:
Charlotte leveled the dual at 1-1 after a win at No. 2 singles, but Driscoll reclaimed the lead for Denver with a straight-sets win at No. 3 singles. She quickly jumped out to a 3-0 lead and stretched it to 5-2 before taking it at 6-3. The second set stayed on serve until they traded breaks at the tail end of the set, sending it a tiebreak that Driscoll won, 7-4.
 
Driscoll's doubles partner Wikander gave DU a 3-1 lead, also winning in two sets. She also held a break lead in the opening set, but Charlotte's Lucia Aranda evened it up late before Wikander broke yet again to take the set, 7-5. The players exchanged breaks early in the second set before Wikander won the final three games.
 
The 49ers began their comeback with three, three-set wins. Martinez de Velasco split 6-2 sets at No. 6 singles before her opponent won the third set. Beltran, too, won her first set at No. 1 singles but lost a lead in the second set and ultimately dropped the match in the third set.
 
The dual came down to No. 5 singles where Otis forced a third set after narrowly losing the first set, 5-7. She started a comeback with 3-0 and 5-1 leads in the second, and then jumped out to a 5-2 lead in the third when all other singles matches had wrapped up. Charlotte's Sara Suchankova leveled things at 5-all before breaking once more to clinch the win.
 
Up Next:
The University of Denver women's tennis team stays in Charlotte for a neutral-site match against Wichita State on Saturday, March 16, at 3 p.m. ET/1 p.m. MT.
 
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