LAKELAND, Fla. – The No. 28-ranked Saint Leo women’s tennis team opened its 2010 campaign with a 9-0 defeat at the hands of No.16 Florida Southern, Wednesday evening from the Beerman Tennis Center.

On the singles side, the Lions fell in six consecutive matches. Jeanette McDonald battled for SLU at No.1 singles, but dropped the hour long affair 6-1, 6-1. Shaena Keefe had an outstanding showing in her No. 2 singles match. Still, the senior captain could not hold serve as her opponent pulled away late, 6-4, 6-3.

Gina Schifano, while dropping her match 6-3, 6-0, did manage to find some soft spots in her tough opponent’s arsenal. However, it was not enough as the Mocs’ took a 3-0 match lead.

After sweeping through the three final singles matches, things swung over to doubles competition. The story of doubles was the play of Keefe and McDonald at No. 1 doubles, as they tested two of the top players in the conference in Senka Softic and Rozite. Despite the efforts though, the pair came up short falling 8-2. Christine Clyne and Schifano also fought through difficult circumstances to make a dent in the scoreboard but it wasn’t enough as the duo dropped also fell in an 8-2 decision.

On his first regular season contest as the Lions head coach, James Bryce stated, “I am happy to get the first one out of the way. I saw moments of brilliance on the court and areas that we still need to work on. We will hit our practice time hard and get ready for Palm Beach this weekend.”

The Lions now get ready to open up the home portion of their schedule, as they play host to the Palm Beach Atlantic Sailfish on Saturday, February 3rd. First serve is set for 1:00 p.m. from the SLU Tennis Center.