DENTON, Texas – The top-seeded and 38^th-ranked FIU women's tennis team advances to its fifth Conference USA Championship appearance in seven years and first since 2021 after downing 65^th-ranked No. 4 seed Louisiana Tech on Saturday, 4-0, on a windy afternoon at the Waranch Tennis Complex. The Panthers are slated to face 58^th-ranked No. 3 seed Rice in Sunday's Championship in Denton, Texas.
 
The Panthers corralled their third straight doubles point to start the match, though, the Bulldogs gave FIU all it could handle prior to seeing the Panthers' 79^th-ranked duo of Kamila Umarova and Ekaterina Khairutdinova secure the clincher in tiebreak fashion at the top spot.
 
No. 3 tandem of Salma Loudili and Katerina Mandelikova set the tone with a 6-3 defeat of LA Tech's Schuknecht and Tetruashvili for their 15^th of the season and third straight, while FIU's 75^th-ranked duo of Yasmine Kabbaj and Oyinlomo Quadre opened strong at No. 2 doubles prior to losing momentum to see an eventual 6-7 (3) defeat to shift the focus to the No. 1 court.
 
Khairutdinova and Umarova rallied back to force a tiebreak scenario, jumping out to a 4-0 lead prior to the Bulldogs closing in at 6-4. From there, Umarova sent a powerful serve to then follow up with a winner that'd seal the deal and hand FIU the doubles point upon the 7-6 (4) victory over LA Tech's Dawson and Rodrigues.
 
The Panthers then used the tight doubles action to fuel the fire in singles, tallying decisive first-set wins on all six courts before freshman Katerina Mandelikova struck first at No. 5 single over Rodrigues, 6-4, 6-1, for the 2-0 advantage.
 
Junior Salma Loudili followed with her 11^th win at the No. 6 position, dropping LA Tech's Vasquez, 6-3, 6-3, prior freshman Oyinlomo Quadre extending her 12^th straight at No. 3 singles for the clincher over Dawson, 6-3, 6-2, to clinch yet another 4-0 win and advance to the finals.
 
Quadre moves to 14-2 and 11-1 at the No. 3 position in dual singles this season, followed by Loudili with a 13-6 mark. Mandelikova moves to 8-4 at the No. 5 position.
 
The last time out against Rice, FIU came up just short in Houston to the then-48^th-ranked Owls, 4-2, on April 2^nd.
 
Despite the loss, the Panthers have had their number recently, collecting wins in three out of the last four matchups – including a pair of neutral site matchups.
 
Rice pulled away over No. 41 Charlotte on the other side of the bracket, 4-2, to meet FIU in tomorrow's finals, as the winner will receive an autobid into the 2023 NCAA Championship.

A win for the Panthers in Sunday's finals would mark just the second time in program history FIU has won a Conference USA title (2018). 
 
UP NEXT
Sunday's C-USA Championship match is scheduled for a 11 a.m. ET start at the Waranch Tennis Complex on the campus of University of North Texas.
 
Additionally, the match will be streamed via Track.Tennis and can be accessible here.  

SOCIAL MEDIA
Fans are encouraged to follow the Panthers on Instagram (@FIUWTENNIS), Twitter (@FIUWTENNIS), and Facebook (Facebook.com\FIUWTN) for all the latest Women's Tennis news.
 
General athletic news can also be found at @FIUSports on Facebook and @FIUAthletics on Twitter and Instagram.