LAKE CHARLES, La.  – Lamar University junior Arina Gudovskaya got out to a strong start Friday afternoon at the 2026 Southland Conference Individual Championships. The league's No. 2 overall seed in singles won a hard-fought three set match to advance.
 
Gudovskaya was pitted up against Southeastern Louisiana's Mariam Makashvili in the opening match and carried the fight to the Lady Lions' top singles player in the opening set. Gudovskaya took the opening frame, 6-1, but Makashvili did not go quietly battling back to take the second set, 6-4, forcing a third. The third set went to a tiebreak before being decided but Gudovskaya came out on top in the match, 6-1, 4-6, 7-6 (the tiebreak scores were not listed during the match). Gudovskaya will face No. 3 seed Leticia Tarocco (A&M-Corpus Christi) Saturday at 10 a.m.
 
In the doubles competition, Lamar's duo of Jevrosima Mitic and Martina Alcaino were the No. 5 overall seed and faced Southeastern's fourth-seeded Mariam Tetradze and Kennedy Hutto. Similar to LU's singles match Friday, the doubles contest would go to a third set. The LU tandem took the opening set, 6-4, but Southeastern fought back in the second to even the match with a 6-4 victory of their own. Unfortunately, SLU would get the victory by taking the third and final set.