The Penn State women's tennis team (7-7, 2-2 Big Ten) jumped back on track this weekend with a 5-2 Big Ten victory over Indiana on Friday.

The victory puts the Nittany Lions at .500 for the second time this season, and also gives them momentum for the following month, which is filled with conference matches against Northwestern, Iowa and Wisconsin.

"We were so excited to win," sophomore Megan Marton said.

"We pulled together really well and all helped each other out when we were in trouble."

Junior Leigh Ann Merryman, along with senior Judy Wang, sophomore Sarah Spence and freshman Lindsay Downing, showed the result of hard conditioning when they won all of their matches in straight sets.

No. 2 Merryman defeated Sarah Batty of Indiana, 7-6, 6-4. No. 4 Wang downed Hoosier Dominika Walterova, 6-3, 6-0.

Spence was victorious at No. 5, beating Sophia Rychilk, 6-0, 6-4, while Downing took her No. 6 singles match, 6-3, 6-0, over Jess Groth.

The Lions also clinched the important doubles point with wins at No. 1 and No. 3. No. 1 doubles duo of Merryman and Maaria Husain defeated Martha Grimm and Batty, 8-2.

Downing and Spence sealed the No. 3 doubles with a 8-3 win over Groth and Rychilk. The Lions are confident after the victory, and felt that the past hard week of practices really paid off.

"We were really excited to beat Indiana this year, after we lost a close one last year," Merryman said. "We really worked a lot harder in practice and conditioned harder."

The Lions prepared and have been preparing for the switch from indoor to outdoor play. The weather needs to be clear and above 42 degrees in order for the team to play outside. The match against Indiana was intended to be played outside, but got moved back indoors with the pending rain.

"All week we worked on our footwork, and our indoor to outdoor mindset," Merryman said.

"The transition causes us to slow down our footwork and learn to not always hit the winners. It makes us more patient."

The Lions will continue to train hard this week in preparation for the Big Ten doubleheader this weekend against No. 17 Illinois (9-4, 2-1) and Purdue (6-8, 1-2).

"We are really excited for this weekend, it's going to be huge," Marton said. "We are going to play some great players."