ABILENE, Texas - The Howard Payne University women's tennis team lost 5-0 to the University of Texas at Tyler in the opening round of the 2017 American Southwest Conference women's tennis championship.

The Lady Jackets fell behind early in the three doubles matches but rallied nearly taking the number two and three doubles points.

In number two double play, Brittony Walker and Callie Molloy lost 8-5 to Lauren Kuhn and Nancy Perez of UT Tyler. Then in number three doubles action, Breanna Hunt and Erin McCleer led 6-5 before falling 8-6 to UTT's Savannah Seely and Alexandra McKissick.

Alex Marlin lost 6-1, 6-0 in number one singles and Brittony Walker fell 6-0, 6-0 in number two singles to give UT Tyler its 5-0 victory. 

In team tournament play, all singles matches start at the same time, so when UT Tyler secured its 5th point the rest of the singles matchups remain unfinished.

Link to full match results

Howard Payne finishes the season with a 5-15 overall record and UT Tyler now stands at 12-8 on the year.