What started out as a gloomy weekend for the Arizona women’s tennis team turned into a third-place finish at the Blue-Gray Classic in Montgomery, Ala.

Heavy rain caused a one-day delay in tournament play, forcing all eight teams to play two matches Saturday.

The Wildcats split the Saturday matches, defeating SMU 4-2 and falling to Virginia 4-0.

“The team really struggled today in both matches,” head coach Vicky Maes said. “Against SMU, we simply played too casually and that got us into a battle. Against Virginia, we came out too flat and when we realized this, is was too late to recover.”

With no doubles matches to warm Arizona up for singles play, sophomore Lacey Smyth and senior Natasha Marks had their first singles losses of the season. Smyth lost to SMU’s Edyta Cieplucha 6-3, 6-4. Meanwhile, Marks won her first singles match against SMU’s Heather Steinbauer in three sets, but Virginia’s Li Xi held her to 6-3, 6-1.

The loss to Virginia fueled the Wildcats’ determination come out strong on Sunday. They swept Illiniois 4-0.

“We came out with more energy,” Maes said. “We started off with doubles play which was nice, but it was a very close win. We turned the weekend around which was very impressive.”