The ISU tennis team will travel to Kalamazoo, Mich., to face Western Michigan on Friday and Marquette on Saturday.

The Cyclones (0-1) are feeling the sting of a 7-0 loss at Minnesota last Friday. They are anxious to get in the win column for the first time this season. While the trip to Minneapolis ended without a victory, the team is starting to grasp some of the concepts that it takes to win.

“We’re just learning to play a little smarter, just trying to establish our game before we fall into the opponent’s game,” said coach Armando Espinosa.

Espinosa pointed to fundamentals and adaptation as reasons why his team lost to the Golden Gophers.

“I think mentally our games need to improve too,” said junior Jenna Langhorst.

The Cyclones will be facing some familiar competition since they played both teams last year.

The Cyclones’ first opponent, Western Michigan (2-2), has already played two Big Ten opponents this season and knows what big-time competition is all about. The Broncos are picked to finish third in the Mid-American Conference and have five upperclassmen on their roster.

Iowa State’s adversary on Saturday, Marquette (2-0), started off the season on the right note with wins over Illinois-Chicago and UW-Green Bay this past weekend.

The Golden Eagles have four upperclassmen on their roster and four of their singles players have winning records so far this year.

“It’s a good team, but I think we have a similar game style so we can definitely win there,” said senior Maria Fernanda Macedo.

In practice, the team has been focusing on aspects it didn’t execute well against the Gophers.

“We worked on adjusting to different game styles, and that’s something that we didn’t do last weekend,” Macedo said. “We’ve played a lot of doubles and tried different combinations, so hopefully that works better this weekend.”

Espinosa said there will be a change in the doubles lineup this weekend. Macedo will play with Langhorst and seniors Tessa Lang and Marie-Christine Chartier will compete together.

“We’re just going to try different things and see if that kind of helps us and if not we’ll evaluate and keep going,” Espinosa said.

The team has been practicing hard all week and working on being ready to play and being able to adapt when necessary.

“We just need to make sure we come out with a lot of energy and make sure our doubles are working,” Espinosa said. “It’s not like they didn’t work in Minnesota, we just didn’t capitalize on our opportunities.”