The UNM men's and women's tennis teams will look to gain some momentum as the Lobos wrap up their pre-conference season with home matches this weekend.
Both teams will start the weekend by playing Boise State University, with the women's team facing the Broncos today and the men's match commencing Sunday. The men also play the University of Nevada at Reno Saturday.
The women go into today with a 6-7 record, but four of the matches were decided by 4-3 scores, including a loss to New Mexico State University Sunday.
The Lobos face another hot team in the Broncos, an opponent that has a five-match winning streak and a 13-2 record.
The Broncos boast two of the top players in the Intercollegiate Tennis Association's Central Region in sophomore Helen Lawson and junior Renate Stoop. Together, Stoop and Lawson make up the 55th ranked doubles team in the nation.
Head coach Kathy Kolankiewicz said the team needs as complete a performance as possible to upend Boise State.
Get content from The Daily Lobo delivered to your inbox
"The key is that we need five of our six top players to play their best, and that's asking a lot, but that's possible," she said. "We can afford one player not to be playing their best."
One player Kolankiewicz said has stepped up has been sophomore Tjasa Suvak. As the team's No. 1 position player, Suvak is 8-5 this season and has upset some of the top players in the Central Region in the process.
She defeated the region's top player and the 53rd-ranked player in the nation, University of Tulsa's Aleksandra Durska, 7-6, 3-6, 6-1 on March 1.
Sunday, she defeated NMSU's Stella Veerman, who is ranked 16th in the region, 7-5, 4-6, 1-2 (retired).
Kolankiewicz said the rest of the players have been plagued by inconsistency and that has hurt the team.
"The others seem to, in their own tennis game, seem to have some ups and downs," she said. "As a team, we can't do that. We need to have five of our six playing their best to beat a team in the top 50."
The men's team, meanwhile, is coming off an impressive showing in Hawai'i, winning three matches against The Naval Academy, Radford University and the University of Hawai'i.
The streak put UNM at 9-5 on the season.
The Lobos will face a struggling UNR team that is 2-12 this season, while the Broncos are 6-8 and have played UNM once this season.
UNM defeated Boise State 5-2 in the Team Indoor Regional championships earlier this year.
Boise State is ranked 75th in the nation and have two ranked players in Guillaume Bouvier at 77th and Marcus Bernston at 98th.
The Lobos have received stellar play from their number one singles player Divan Coetzee, who has won eight straight matches and nine of his last 10.
He is currently ranked 116th in the nation, but has beaten his last three ranked opponents and is 5-3 against ranked opposition.
Coetzee is 1-1 against Bouvier and Bernston, defeating Bernston 6-2, 6-4 while falling to Bouvier 6-1, 6-0 in October.
Bart Scott, who was named the Mountain West's player of the week March 6, has been equally dominant, winning six matches in a row and eight of his last nine.
The women's match today begins at 2 p.m., while the men's match Saturday begins at 2 p.m. and Sunday at 11:30 a.m.
All three matches will take place at the Lobo Tennis Club.
