Issue date: 2/18/10 Section: Sports

Media Credit: Sonya Johnson Catarina Branco returns a ball during her singles victory.

Media Credit: Trey Burke Anouk Faure won her doubles match against Evansville.

The Colonels celebrated Valentine's Day weekend with a little joy and a little heartbreak.

The women's tennis team crushed Cumberland on Friday, before losing a tough match to Evansville on Saturday.

Eastern (2-6) defeated Cumberland 7-0 behind the effort of the newest Colonels. Cumberland entered the match ranked 22 in the NAIA polls.

The Colonels started the match by winning both of the doubles matches played. The doubles teams were made up of Eastern's three freshmen and sophomore Alyze Pagal.

Pagal and freshman Jessica Albuquerque, Catarina Branco and Esimira Gheisary also picked up singles wins for the Colonels as Coach Rob Oertel rested his veterans.

"Our new, younger players picked up some valuable experience today that should help them in future matches," Oertel told EKUsports.com.

Albuquerque, Gheisary and Pagal won their matches in straight sets.

The team captain and lone senior, Anais Hamel won her match by default.

On Saturday, however the Colonels weren't able to pull off the win against Evansville.

Hamel and Anouk Faure won their doubles match, but Evansville won the other two doubles matches to earn the 1-0 lead for the overall match.

The Colonels and the Purple Aces (4-2) split the remaining singles matches 3-3.

Myriem Mhirit at the 2 position, Hamel at 5 and Gheisary at 6 were Eastern's singles victories.

Albuquerque took her match to the third set before falling 6-3, 1-6, 6-4.

"We need to do a better job of closing out matches after we get the lead," Oertel said.

The Colonels will host a pair of NAIA opponents this weekend as they play the University of the Cumberlands and Georgetown College on Saturday at the Greg Adams Indoor Tennis Center. The match with the Cumberlands begins at 9 a.m.

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