The Creighton men’s tennis team is looking to get back on track Saturday after having its three-match win streak snapped last weekend by the No. 75 Oklahoma State University Cowboys. The Jays will be traveling to Des Moines, Iowa to take on the No. 46 Drake University Bulldogs in the Missouri Valley Conference opener. The Bulldogs will be a stiff test, one head tennis coach Tom Lilly said he is looking forward to.

“[the Bulldogs] are nationally ranked and have beaten several other nationally ranked teams so we are looking forward to the challenges they present,” Lilly said.

The Jays will head to Des Moines sporting an 8-4 record after navigating the non- conference schedule.

Creighton won its first three matches of the season, including a 4-3 victory against defending Summit League champion University of Missouri at Kansas City in which senior Kyle Obermeier clinched the win by coming from behind to topple his opponent in three sets.

The team dropped it’s next two matches, one against No. 70 University of Nebraska- Lincoln 1-6 and the other against the University of Idaho 3-4. The Bluejays then went 5-1 over their next six matches, losing only to St. Joseph’s University in a close 3-4 match before falling to Oklahoma State this past weekend.

The Jays are off to a good start this season and Lilly believes the close losses will help his team down the road.

“So far we are happy with how our season has unfolded,” Lilly said. “We also know that we were literally just a few points away from being 10-2 as our losses to Idaho and St. Joe’s were that close to being wins for us. This will continue to make our guys strive to get better as our conference is very tough and we will need to play our best to get some wins against the Valley teams.”