REDLANDS, Calif. - With its spring break trip winding down, the Whitman College women's tennis scored a thrilling win which came down to the final singles match in a 5-4 win at 14th-ranked University of Redlands on Friday afternoon.

"Today was huge for us and it was so fun to play alongside the men's team," said head coach John Hein, speaking of the Blues men's team also squaring off with Redlands. "We've known we have a special team but to come on the road and get one of the biggest wins in our program's history was incredible. It was a 15-woman effort and I'm so happy for them to have earned this win. Tomorrow we've got another great opponent in Caltech, so we're excited for that ."

The Blues needed a singles rally after dropping two of the three doubles matches. Angel Le and Arianna Castellanos fell on the No. 1 court, but Illina Jha and Camilla Tarpey-Schwed squared matters with their 8-5 win over the Bulldog pair of Rockwood and Goldstein. Redlands would take the lead into singles, however, after Jin Yu and Teleya Blunt lost a close second doubles match 8-6.

Singles play saw the Bulldogs come out on top with the first two matches to finish. Yu and Jha both fell in straight sets on the No. 3 and No. 5 courts, respectively, to put Redlands within one win of the victory.

The Whitman leads on the No. 1, No. 4 and No. 6 courts would hold up. Le topped Bolock in straight sets at the one, and Tarpey-Schwed did the same to Goldstein at the four with a tiebreak win in set two. Blunt also won in straight sets, her second set a tiebreaker as well, as the match came down to Castellanos and Rockwood at second singles. Castellanos rallied from a set down to win 4-6, 6-3, 6-3 and give her team the win.

The Blues close the trip with a visit to Caltech on Saturday, March 18 at 2:00 p.m.