MOBILE, Ala. – Junior Alexandria Stiteler (Bradenton, Fla.) and freshman Yu Fujioka (Funabashi, Japan) teamed up for a doubles win and picked up two singles victories apiece in the University of South Alabama women's tennis team's 4-3 defeat of Louisiana Tech Tuesday afternoon at the Bruce David Lubel Memorial Tennis Courts.

DOUBLES
-Stiteler and Fujioka opened doubles play with a 6-2 win over Nadja Manjon and Angela Lorenzo on court 2
-Junior Alina Zolotareva (Barnaul, Russia) and freshman Nikola Kohoutova (Kralupy nad Vltavou, Czech Republic) claimed the doubles point after downing Sonia Chen and Claudia Oravcova 6-3 at No. 3

SINGLES
-The Jaguars clinched the match early on the strength of three straight-set victories
-Fujioka blanked Oravcova 6-0, 6-0, and Stiteler, ranked No. 99 by the ITA, topped Karla De La Luz 6-2, 6-1
-Junior Patricia Martins (Lisbon, Portugal) clinched the match on court 6, defeating Andrea Perez-Lopez 6-1, 6-3
-The Bulldogs picked up two of their points in three-set matches
-Manjon pulled one back with a 6-2, 7-6 win over Zolotareva on court 2
-Lorenzo edged freshman Maxine Palmen (Sittard, The Netherlands) in a supertiebreaker 4-6, 6-4, (10-7), and Chen rallied for a 3-6, 6-0, 7-5 win against freshman Milka Pasanen (Pieksämäki, Finland)
 
NOTES
-The victory is the sixth straight for the Jaguars as they improve to 11-1 on the season.
-USA is 13-0 all time against La Tech; today's match was the first decided by one point since 1983. The last time the Bulldogs took as many as two points from the Jaguars was a 5-2 loss in 1992.
-Fujioka and Martins continued their undefeated start to the spring season, improving to 11-0 and 7-0, respectively.
-Stiteler is now 8-1 on the season, all on court 1.
-Fujioka and Stiteler, and Kohoutova and Zolotareva were paired together in doubles for the first time this season.
-South Alabama opens a three-match road trip Saturday against Troy in Conway, S.C.

QUOTES FROM HEAD COACH KEYSER
Opening statement: "There are two sides to it. It was tough conditions; you weren't going to play great, quality tennis, but from the standpoint of coming out and doing good things in doubles, and the way we started in singles, we looked really good. They have some good competitors and they hung tough. There are still quite a few things we have to work on and get better at."

On if we're playing our best tennis at the right time: "I think we're getting there. The ceiling is so high with this team, but some days we're very raw, and up and down. We're just trying to smooth it out. I think as long as everybody stays patient, in a couple of weeks I think we'll be very dangerous."

On what the team is doing well right now: "I think we're competing at a high level. I don't think everyone has their A-game, but they compete really hard. They try and apply what we work on, we just have to get better at our execution. But the good thing is, we're doing a good job in practice, it's just a matter of time until we do it in matches."

For more information about South Alabama athletics, check back with www.usajaguars.com, and follow the Jaguars at www.twitter.com/USAJaguarSports. Season tickets for all Jaguar athletic events can be purchased by calling (251) 461-1USA (1872).

Join the Baseline Club, the tennis-specific support club of the Jaguar Athletic Fund. All donations to the Baseline Club go directly to support the South Alabama men's and women's tennis programs. For more information on how you can join visit: http://jaguarathleticfund.com/baselineclub

—USA—