Bearcats Spoil Season Home Finale

Men's Box Score | Women's Box Score

KIRKSVILLE, Mo. – In the final home tennis dual of the season, the Southwest Baptist University Bearcats narrowly swept the Truman Bulldogs on Monday afternoon. The Bearcats won the women match 9-0 and then rallied to defeat the Truman men 5-4. The teams will not play at Missouri Valley on Tuesday and will next be in action on Thursday against Washburn in Kansas City. That match is being played at Rockhurst University.

The men grabbed a 2-1 advantage out of doubles with Jake Ohlhausen and Griffin Smith winning 8-5 at number two and Mike Merchant and Adam King winning 8-3 at number three.

The Bearcats won the first three singles matches, all in straight sets to take a 4-2 lead however King picked up a 6-3, 6-1 win for the Bulldogs first singles point. Kirk Schlueter downed Jon Shinn at number six to square the match and attention was turned to court five to decide the outcome.

Merchant dropped the first set 7-5 to Alex Belote but came back to win 6-2 to force a tie-break. In the final set, Belote escaped with a 7-6 (7-5) winner to give the #28 Bearcats the victory.

The 14th ranked women's team from Southwest Baptist was able to win all nine matches against to spoil the season finale for the Bulldogs.

Jennifer Hawkins, Ellen Russell and Dagmar Velez played in their final match on campus for the women while Eric McCollough and Mark Sturley did so for the men. Prior to the match, the team presented Coach Pete Kendall with a watch in recognition of his retirement.

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