FREDERICKSBURG, Va.- Members of the Randolph women's tennis team began the first day of competition at the ITA Southeast Regional Championship hosted by Mary Washington on Saturday.

In the Championship draw of singles play, Lena Kersten (Bonn, Germany/Otto Kuhne Schule) faced off against Alessandra Armour from Ursinus College. Kersten won the match 6-1, 6-0. In the next round, Kersten went up against Zoe Angell from Carnegie Mellon. Kersten was able to get past Angell 6-4, 6-4 to advance to the Round of 16 and become the first women's player in program history to do so. She will go up against Ava Li from Johns Hopkins tomorrow afternoon at 12:00 pm.

Fellow WildCat Lize van Veen (Harderwijk, The Netherlands) played Mary Kate Kahl from Washington and Lee in Randolph's other entry in the Championship draw. Van Veen lost 6-4, 6-1. Fleur Gaalman dropped a 6-1, 6-3 decision to Milagros Carbajal Diaz from Stevens Institute of Technology in the Blue 3 draw.

In the Championships draw doubles portion, Kersten and Van Veen teamed up to defeat Brianna Viets and Ella Strickler from Swarthmore 8-4. They went on to face ODAC rivals Kahl and Allie Murrell from W&L and fell by the score of 8-5.

In the Blue draw of double play, Gaalman and Emma Bauer (Munich, Germany) won 8-5 over Gigi Arenas and Wei Wei Lai from Stevens. The duo then went on to defeat Allison Cherwien and Erin Talko from Shenandoah 8-6. Gaalman and Bauer now advance to the semifinals against Amber Manspeaker and Cleopatra Solomon from St. Mary's College of Maryland which takes place tomorrow morning at 8:00 am.