Hope Results | Occidental Results
LOS ANGELES – The College of Saint Benedict tennis team split the final two matches of its spring break trip Thursday in Los Angeles. CSB started the day with a 7-2 win over Hope International before falling 6-3 to Occidental.
 
Saint Benedict is now 9-3 overall as it heads back to Minnesota. The team plays a pair of nonconference matches before jumping into the heart of MIAC play.
 
"(Thursday) was a battle," head coach Michael Engdahl said. "It was a great matchup for us, and it is the type of MIAC match we will see later in April. Even though we didn't get the win, we definitely took steps forward."
 
CSB started the day Thursday with a 7-2 win over Hope. Hope only had three healthy and eligible players, so the team won two doubles matches and three singles matches by default. Hope won at No. 1 doubles and No. 3 singles, but Tessa Rahrick won 6-1, 7-6 at No. 1 singles and Erin Kolbow picked up a 6-3, 6-1 win at No. 2 singles.
 
In its second match of the day, Erin Kolbow and Lauren Clark picked up a hard-fought win, 9-8, 8-6, at No. 3 doubles to get CSB on the board. Occidental won at No. 1 and No. 2 doubles. Kolbow won her first set 6-4 at No. 2 singles, but fell 7-5, 10-7 in the tiebreaker. Kayla McIver won 6-2, 6-2 at No. 4 singles, and Mackenzie Schurhamer won 6-4, 6-2 at No. 5 singles. Occidental won at No. 1, 2, 3 and 6 singles.
 
CSB is off now until March 17 when it heads to Duluth, Minn., to take on both Minnesota-Duluth and UW-Superior.