The WSU tennis team (5-1) returned to the friendly confines and relative warmth of the Hollingberry Fieldhouse for three weekend matches, beginning today against Brigham Young, and a pair of matches on tomorrow against UC Santa Barbara and Seattle.

The BYU Cougars will travel to Pullman with a 0-2 record, having dropped a pair of matches last weekend against two ranked squads, No. 28 Tulsa and No. 41 Washington.

WSU and BYU stand dead even in the all-time series at 7-7, with BYU capturing a 4-3 decision in Provo last season.

UCSB enters Saturday’s match sporting a 1-3 record. The Gauchos defeated Loyola Marymount 4-3 last weekend.

Washington State currently sits at 3-2 in the all-time series, although UCSB won the face off in 2009 5-2.

Meanwhile, Seattle dropped its first five matches of the 2014 season and has only defeated WSU once in eight opportunities.

WSU won three-straight road matches including a two-match sweep last weekend in Missoula.

The Cougars took a decisive 6-1 victory against Montana by earning the doubles point and then five singles wins en route to the victory.

The match served as Montana’s first live competition of the season, while WSU was already four matches into their schedule.

“We had more experience playing together as a team due to our schedule so we were really fired up about the weekend and everyone was excited to play,” said sophomore Lize Leenknecht, the team captain.

Against Minnesota, in the first meeting between the two schools, the Cougars surrendered the doubles point but rallied back in order to take four singles matches.

Junior Elizaveta Luzina recorded a straight-set win against Minnesota junior Tereza Brichacova, the No. 65 ranked player in the nation. The match served as Luzina’s best ranked opponent win in her career as a Cougar.

Leenknecht rallied from a set down to clinch the win with a three-set victory at No. 2.

The win served as the Cougars’ first against a Big Ten since 2003, when they beat Penn State.

“We don’t see a lot of Big Ten opponents, but we’ve lost some pretty close matches to them recently, so it’s nice to be on the other end of that and beat some of the bigger schools from BCS conferences,” Head Coach Lisa Hart said.

Luzina has played very good tennis for the Cougars. The Russian native has posted a 16-3 mark thus far and is 5-1 in dual matches while playing in the No. 1 position.

She enters this weekend’s matches with 66 career wins, just 10 shy of breaking into the top 10 list at WSU.

One of the biggest factors in the Cougars’ 5-1 record so far this season has revolved around their doubles play.

“We spend a lot of time on doubles, and our players are very coachable,” Hart said. “They’re committed to putting in the work every day and it’s really paying off in their matches, which is nice to see the rewards.”

Leenknecht said she thinks the experience of the three doubles teams playing together has been the key to their success.

“I play with Liza and I know we have good chemistry together and a feeling of the game on how to win, we all do,” Leenknecht said.

Hart said she likes the way the team fighting and competing right now and feels that her team’s drive and desire to win is going to continue to lead to the Cougars down the right path.

“We have more than enough talent to get the job done and just need to go about finding the way to win each match,” she said.

The Cougars face off against BYU today at 10 a.m. while Saturday’s matches against UC Santa Barbara and Seattle begin at 10:30 a.m. and 6 p.m., respectively.