PITTSBURGH, Pa. – After playing their last conference match one month ago, Franciscan men's tennis returned to conference play with a decisive 9-0 sweep of Penn St.-Altoona.

"This definitely was our biggest, toughest opponent in conference," head coach Jeremy Ellis said. "9-0 is kind of deceiving. The matches were closer than that. They're going to be gunning for us, but everyone pulled out big matches."

The Barons started out shaky in doubles play, down on all three courts, but were able to turn it around for an initial 3-0 lead.

The pair of Zachary and Joseph Quiza at no. 1 doubles played the toughest match of the night. The brothers found themselves down a double break at 5-7 but came back to win four straight games, winning their match 9-7.

"For them to win, they have to stay focused the whole time," Ellis said. "They sometimes start out real slow and it's tough for them to get in the zone. They finally got it together and played good tennis."

The other two doubles teams of Jarek Sulak/John Gallagher and Mitchell Plys/Connor Jooste won 9-7(4) and 8-5 at no. 2 and no. 3 respectively.

Singles play went much smoother, with Zach Quiza also playing the toughest singles match at no. 1. The junior captain won in three sets 6-4, 4-6 and 10-3 in the super tiebreaker as the overall match had already been decided.

Franciscan and Altoona were originally supposed to face off on March 1 but the match was cancelled due to bad weather; otherwise, there would not have been such a large gap in between conference matches. Ellis said that returning to conference play after a long time is both good and bad for the team.

"It's good because the matches we tend to play outside of conference are really tough, so it gives us a lot of practice," Ellis said. "It's bad because there is always a little bit of added pressure in conference matches. Not having that needed pressure for over a month was tough, but the guys came out and performed."

The Barons will have a quick turnaround in between matches as they travel to take on Penn St.-Behrend March 21 at 4 pm