After playing its first eight matches on the road, the Texas A&M women’s tennis team finally makes its home season debut Tuesday as the Aggies play host to in-state rival and former Southwest Conference-foe SMU. First serve against the No. 22 Mustangs is slated for 6 p.m. at the George P. Mitchell Tennis Center.
“The best thing about this match is that we are finally able to play at home and in front of our fans,” A&M coach Bobby Kleinecke said. “We’ve had a tough road trek to start out the season, and I know the girls and the coaches are excited to be able to play on our home court. It definitely will be fun for us, and I hope our fans are also excited to come see us play.”
The Aggies evened their record at 4-4 by topping TCU, 5-2, Saturday in Fort Worth. A&M won the doubles point for the sixth time this season, and the Aggies got straight-set singles wins from Nazari Urbina (Xalapa, Veracruz, Mexico), Morgan Frank (Oldsmar, Fla.), Lauren Santacroce (Spring, Texas) and Christi Liles (Largo, Fla.) at the No. 2-5 lines, respectively, for the winning margin.
It was the seventh consecutive win for Frank, who improved to 7-1 in dual matches and 10-4 overall. Urbina also improved her spring record to 7-1 and 18-4 overall after winning her sixth straight match.
SMU (12-2) had its eight-match winning streak snapped and suffered only its second loss of the season as the Mustangs fell to No. 33 Texas, 4-3, in Austin on Saturday. SMU lost two of three doubles matches and fell in straight sets at the Nos. 3, 4 and 6 singles positions. The Mustangs did, however, improve to 12-0 at the No. 1 line and 13-0 at the No. 2 position. No. 59 Marta Lesniak remained undefeated with a three-set victory over No. 26 Aeriel Ellis at the top of the lineup, and Aleksandra Malyarchikova also stayed unbeaten with a three-set victory over 50th-ranked Vanja Corovic at the No. 2 line.
SMU, which defeated TCU, 7-0, earlier this season, holds a 15-11 lead in the all-time series against the Aggies, although A&M has won six of the last eight meetings between the two schools. Last year, SMU snapped a three-match losing skid against the Aggies, defeating A&M, 4-1, and eliminating the Aggies in the first round of the NCAA tournament, played in Waco, Texas.
“SMU is a very good team, a step up from where they were last year when they beat us in the first round of NCAAs,” Kleinecke said. “It is going to take a great effort on our part to come away with the win.”
General admission tickets are $6 for adults and $4 for students and youth. Tickets may be purchased anytime online at tickets.12thmanfoundation.com or at the main entrance to the tennis center beginning one hour prior to the start of the match.
All newly appointed Fish Camp counselors will be admitted free to the SMU match by either wearing their Fish Camp T-shirts or with a flyer they received.
In addition, the popular “Where’s Wilson” promotion continues this season. Wilson, a smiling tennis ball, will be hiding at every home match this season at the Mitchell Tennis Center. The one lucky fan who finds him each match will receive a prize compliments of Texas A&M University and will be entered into a grand prize contest which will be held during the women’s tennis team’s State Farm Lone Star Showdown match against rival Texas on April 20. Fans are encouraged to come out to the matches early to increase their chances of being the first person to find Wilson.
Free live video streaming and live scoring of all A&M home women’s tennis matches is available at AggieAthletics.com.
