LA JOLLA, Calif. ? The No. 23 UC San Diego women's tennis team picked up an 8-1 victory over Concordia University Irvine at home Thursday as the Tritons in the top positions battled through tough tiebreakers to secure victories while the rest of the UCSD roster cruised to relatively easy wins.

The Tritons improved to 11-10 with the victory, dropping the Eagles to 8-7 this season. The match, originally slated for Feb. 20 but rescheduled due to rain, was played on UCSD's Northview Tennis Courts.

To start the contest, UCSD went 3-0 in doubles action. The freshman pair of Taskeen Bains and Natalie Varnay, positioned No. 4 in the latest Intercollegiate Tennis Assocation regional poll, squeezed out a 9-7 win over CUI's Amanda Varela and Jessica Rice. The other Triton duos, Kimmi Dao and Valerie Tang at No. 2 and Justine Ang Fonte and Dalya Perelman at No. 3, collected victories with scores of 8-3 and 8-4 respectively.

Varnay, ranked No. 6 in the West Region and No. 32 in the nation as a singles player, continued her impressive performance Thursday with a match against CUI's best, Varela. The two played to an even 7-6, 6-7 start before Varnay pulled out the 10-4 tiebreaker for the victory.

“They had some really tough points,” Triton head coach Liz LaPlante said. “Natalie played extra hard in that tiebreaker and they were almost tied all the way through.”

At the No. 2 singles position, Perelman played tight with Rice but in the end the Eagles earned their sole point of the match after another tiebreaker was needed to settle the score, 4-6, 7-5, 1-0 (10-5).

Through positions three through six, UCSD's Dao, Fonte, Molly Sullens and Tang combined to only lose eight games ? while winning 48 ? during their straight-set victories.

The Tritons continue CCAA play with their last home regular season match on Wednesday, April 16 against Cal Poly Pomona starting at 2 p.m.