LAKELAND - No. 10 Florida Southern opened the home portion of its 2015 spring schedule here on Valentine's Day by falling 8-1 to No. 3 ranked Saint Leo in Sunshine State Conference action at the Wynee Warden Tennis Center.
In Saturday's Valentine's Day match, the Moccasins (0-2, 0-1 SSC) collected its only win at the No. 1 doubles spot in the line-up as the team's lone seniors, Magda Riutort (Petra, Spain) and Olivia Spagnuolo (Andover, Mass.) earned an 8-6 victory over SLU's No. 1 team of Isabella Robbiani and Maria Benkirane.
The other two doubles matches belonged to the Lions (2-1 overall, 1-0 SSC) as they earned an 8-1 win at the No. 2 spot and an 8-0 win at the No. 3 spot.
Five of the six singles matches were decided in two sets, all of which were won by SLU.
The only singles match that went more than two sets was at the No. 1 spot as Riutort and Robbiani needed a third set tiebreaker to decide a winner. Riutort opened the match by picking up a 7-6 win in the first set, before Robbiani earned a 6-4 win in the second set to force a third set tiebreaker. In the tiebreaker, Robbiani was able to hang on 10-4 to give Riutort her first singles loss of the spring season.
Two of the other singles matches featured at least one competitive game as at the No. 2 spot, Spagnuolo was able to win six games against Anastasia Wagner, including suffering a 7-5 loss in the second set. Wagner won the first set, 6-1.
Meanwhile, freshman Katie Stanford (Lake Worth, Fla.) won five games off of Katherine Zaatini at the No. 6 spot as Zaatini won 6-1, 6-4.
The Moccasins will conclude its two-match homestand on Tuesday, Feb. 17 with a 3 p.m. match-up against ninth-ranked Rollins (1-1 overall, 0-0 SSC).
