The men and women of the Troy University tennis teams hit the road to compete in the Sun Belt Conference tournament on Thursday, April 19, with the men falling in the first round and the women moving to the quarterfinals before being stopped by FIU.

The men’s team (5-18) opened play against no. 71 Louisiana-Lafayette (15-7) on Thursday, falling 4-1 against the Ragin’ Cajuns to end their season.

The Trojans recorded a lone win courtesy of freshman Mansingh Athare, who at number five singles recorded a 6-4, 6-4 victory.

In singles play the Trojan men left two unfinished matches in the second and sixth, with sophomores Sami Ghorbel going 6-2, 3-6, 2-1 and Tadju Davies recording 6-3, 1-6, 3-0 before being cut short.

The loss marks the end of the 2011-12 season for the Trojan men, who faced a year with a young team made up primarily of sophomores who were unable to find a conference win.

The team will return in the fall with a higher degree of experience, with the wide majority of their players returning to the court.

While the men’s team faced difficulty in round one of the tournament, the women’s team (11-10) was able to record a win in round one, taking down Arkansas-Little Rock 4-0.

The Trojan women were able to capture the doubles point despite a tough 8-1 loss at number two doubles, a loss which they were able to make up for with wins at one and three.

The combination of junior Karoline Grymel and sophomore Lyubov Dorofeeva brought in the first doubles win 8-6, while freshman Candela Munoz Giron and senior Olfa Dhaoui brought in another doubles win 8-3.

In singles play the Trojan women were able to dominate the UALR players, recording singles wins in three spots with three matches going unfinished.

Dhaoui took the first Troy win in the third 6-0, 6-1 with Giron coming right behind in the fourth 6-2, 6-1 to set the pace for the Trojans, with Rosaura Ramirez-Vega finding another win in the sixth 6-0, 6-1.

The women were able to advance to the quarterfinals to face FIU, who managed to end the Trojans championship hopes with a 4-3 win.

FIU managed to come back from a lengthy rain delay to capture three consecutive singles matches in the fourth, fifth and sixth.

Grymel and Dhaoui were the only Trojans to take singles matches on the day, with the former winning 6-1, 6-0 and the latter coming out on top 6-0, 6-4.

In doubles the Trojans recorded two doubles wins, with Dorofeeva and Grymel taking the first 8-5 and Giron and Dhaoui taking the third 8-6.

The loss for the women brought an end to the Trojans time at the Sun Belt tournament and ended the season for the program.

The women were able to record 2 wins in the Sun Belt this season against Arkansas State and UALR earlier in the year, and will return next season with much of their team intact.