ORLANDO, Fla. — Michigan Tech men's tennis team dropped its first two full matches during its spring break trip in Orlando. The Huskies were defeated, 7-2, by St. Cloud State last Saturday (March 8) before falling, 9-0, to No. 14-ranked Florida Southern today.

Tech led St. Cloud State, 2-1, by winning at number one and three doubles. Brett Girard and Matt Tronnes posted an 8-5 victory at number one while Justin Foley and Chris Verhulst gained an 8-4 triumph at number three.

SCSU won at number two doubles and swept the singles matches. St. Cloud won number two through five singles in straight sets. Girard claimed his first set at number one singles, but lost 3-6, 6-3, 1-0 (10-7) in a supertiebreaker.

"We started well against St. Cloud, but could not keep it up," said head coach Mike Axford. "It was very windy and made for interesting tennis."

Florida Southern, which is perennially one of the top teams in NCAA Division II, shut out the Huskies. Tech junior Alan Parenteau was involved in the two closest matches of the day — an 8-3 loss at number two doubles and a 6-1, 6-2 setback at number three singles.

"Today's match vs. Florida Southern was very tough," said Axford. "They are a good team that did not give us any free points."

Michigan Tech (2-7) has two more matches scheduled for its spring trip — one tomorrow vs. Dowling and one Thursday (March 13) vs. Southern Illinois-Edwardsville.

Notes: Tech played two matches last Friday (March 7) that did not count. The first was a 9-0 loss to Vincennes in an exhibition match. The other was a match against Moravian that was suspended because of rain. The score was 3-3 before play was halted. Because of travel schedules, the match could not be resumed.