COLLEGE STATION – The Texas A&M women’s tennis team hits the road this weekend to take on rival and future Southeastern Conference foe LSU Sunday in Baton Rouge, La. First serve is slated for 1 p.m. at the W.T. ‘Dub’ Robinson Stadium.
“We are definitely looking forward to playing LSU,” A&M first-year head coach Howard Joffe said. “Last weekend we got to play two good teams, and we have a little bit of competitive mileage behind us now and obviously we want to keep that going. LSU is a pretty good team with a national ranking, and so this is a good opportunity for us to try to beat a good team on the road.”
The Aggies are 1-1 and ranked 30th in the nation after opening the 2012 dual campaign at the ITA Kick-Off Weekend in Tallahassee, Fla., last weekend. A&M fell to Ole Miss, 4-3, and then defeated Ohio State, 5-2. The Aggies were led by 11th-ranked Cristina Sanchez-Quintanar, who went 2-0 at the No. 1 singles line, including a 6-2, 6-2 victory over 12th-ranked Kristi Boxx of Ole Miss. A&M senior Lauren Santacroce also went undefeated in singles, posting a 2-0 mark at the No. 4 line.
The Aggies enter the match with three ranked singles players. In addition to Sanchez-Quintanar, junior Sun Wen is No. 61 and junior Nazari Urbina is ranked No. 105.
The Tigers, under the direction of 21st-year head coach Tony Minnis, are ranked No. 65 and are 1-0 after recording a 7-0 shutout in their season opener at Colorado on Jan. 22. Senior Whitney Wolf improved to 12-5 overall with a straight-set victory at the No. 1 line as LSU went on to win five of six singles matches in two sets. In addition, Wolf teamed with junior Keri Frankenberger and posted an 8-3 victory in doubles, as the tandem helped the Tigers capture the doubles point while improving to 6-2 overall.
A&M is 21-10 all-time against LSU since 1980 and has won each of the last two meetings and six of the last seven contests. Last year, the Aggies made their home season debut by holding off the Tigers, 4-3, at the Mitchell Tennis Center. A&M made late comebacks to win two of three doubles matches to take the early lead. The Aggies went on to build a 3-0 lead before Ariel Morton put the Tigers on the scoreboard with a win at No. 6 singles. In a match-up of ranked opponents, 17th-ranked Nazari Urbina then clinched the winning point for the Aggies with a 7-5, 6-3 victory over 33rd-ranked Wolf at the No. 1 line. LSU picked up wins at the No. 3 and No. 5 singles positions to close out the match.
Click here for live scoring updates of Sunday’s A&M-LSU match or click on the link on the A&M women’s tennis schedule page on AggieAthletics.com