HILTON HEAD, S.C. - Webster University concluded play here Thursday evening in the Spring TennisFest by posting a 7-2 victory over Marietta College at the Chaplin Park Tennis Center to extend its win streak to six consecutive matches and finish with a perfect 4-0 record at the event. 

With Thursday's win, Webster improves to 6-2 on the season and its six match win streak is the longest for the program since winning six straight matches during the 2013 season. Along with winning six consecutive matches in 2013, Webster also had a 13 match win streak that same season. Marietta fell to 3-5 with the loss. 

"It was a great week for our guys. It gives us a lot to build off of and were able to end things with a really solid win against a good opponent in Marietta," Webster head coach Mike Siener said. "Tonight's match could've gone either way, but we were able to pull out seven matches and play well in the process."

In Thursday's match, the Gorloks opened by winning two of the three doubles matches to take a 2-1 lead in the match, before winning five of the six singles matches, including winning one of them at the No. 6 spot in a third-set tiebreaker. 

Against Marietta, WU won at both No. 1 and No. 2 doubles by identical 8-5 scores, while its No. 3 team of junior Nicolas Andrade (Quito, Ecuador/Francis Howell) and freshman Tanner Haugen (Jefferson City, Mo./Jefferson City) fell 8-6 to Marietta's tandem of Bryce Emerick and Will Watson. 

At the No. 1 doubles spot, junior Riley Muren (O'Fallon, lll./Illinois-Springfield) and sophomore Austin Nation (Oklahoma City, Okla./Purcell) played perhaps their best match of the season, according to Siener. The Webster duo trailed 4-3 early in the match, but answered by winning four straight games en route to posting an 8-5 win. Muren and Nation went 2-1 in doubles at the Spring TennisFest. 

Senior Charlie McGhee (Waterloo, Ill./Waterloo) and his doubles partner at the No. 2 spot, sophomore Tom Shutzman (St. Louis, Mo./Parkway South) also trailed 4-3 early in their match against Marietta's duo of Eric DeLong and Hanyang Zhang, before bouncing back like Muren and Nation at the No. 1 spot to win the next four games en route to earning an 8-5 win. McGhee and Shutzman went a perfect 3-0 in doubles play at the Spring TennisFest. 

Meanwhile, in singles action, Webster posted wins at the No. 1, No. 2, No. 3, No. 5 and No. 6 spots, but Marietta's Watson prevented a singles sweep for the Gorloks as he earned a win in a third set tiebreaker at the No. 4 spot against Shutzman. In that match, Watson the opening set, 6-2, but Shutzman rallied to win the second set 6-2 and then Watson would pull out the match win by earning a 10-4 win in the tiebreaker. 

Muren continued his dominance at No. 1 singles as he tallied a 6-0, 6-0 win at the top spot in the line-up over Marietta's Shane Spencer. Muren went 4-0 in singles at the Spring TennisFest and dropped a total of 15 games on the week, including winning two of the four matches by 6-0, 6-0 scores. 

Nation also continued his solid play at the No. 2 spot as he picked up a 6-4, 6-4 win over Jack Hirschfield to finish with a 4-0 record in singles at the Spring TennisFest. Nation, who is 5-2 on the season in singles, has already eclipsed the two singles wins he had all of last season as he went 2-13 in singles play during the 2018 campaign.

"Austin is continuing to show great strides and is really hitting the ball well and playing with confidence," said the Webster coach about Nation's play so far this season. 

McGhee also posted a win at No. 3 singles on Thursday to finish the event with a 4-0 record. In Thursday's match, McGhee posted a 6-2, 6-0 win over DeLong. McGhee is 6-1 in singles on the season and with those six singles wins, he has moved into a tie for fifth on the school's career singles wins chart with 30. The school record for career singles wins is 56, which was set by Ricky Eaves from 2010-13. 

Haugen, who went 3-0 in singles at the Spring TennisFest, played a hard fought battle at No. 5 singles on Thursday against Zhang. In the match, Haugen won 6-1, 6-4, but both players passed a lot of balls and played two extremely tight matches. 

Webster's final singles win came at the No. 6 spot as freshman Harsh Jaswal (OFallon, Mo./Fort Zumwalt West) picked up his first collegiate singles win in a third set tiebreaker against Emerick. Against Emerick, Jaswell fell 6-2 in the first set, but rallied to post a 6-3 win in the second set to force a tiebreaker. The tiebreaker was a back-and-forth affair that Jaswell ultimately pulled out, 10-8. 

The Gorloks will now return home to St. Louis this weekend and will return to the courts on Thursday, March 21 for a 6 p.m. home match at the Webster Groves Tennis Center against Illinois College. The Illinois College match will be the first of five home matches this season for Webster.