AUBURN, Ala. – No. 9 Women’s tennis is set to play Kentucky on Friday at 4 p.m. CT in Lexington and No. 6 Tennessee on Sunday at 1 p.m. CT in Knoxville. The Tigers are coming off a split weekend, falling at home to No. 10 Oklahoma before securing a road win over Arkansas.
“This time of the year, you never know if you are going to be indoors or outdoors, and there’s a chance of rain on both Friday and Sunday,” Auburn head coach Jordan Szabo said. “We’ve actually played really good indoor tennis this year, so I am not concerned about the chance of moving indoors. Kentucky is right on the bubble for the NCAAs, so a win over a top-10 team like us would do wonders for their résumé. Sunday’s match will be huge for both teams when it comes to seeding for the NCAA tournament and positioning for the SEC Championship. We’ve played a top-10 opponent almost every weekend, but we want to be a team that is playing in big matches all the time and getting comfortable doing it.”
With the match against the Sooners tied at three, a three-set victory at the No. 4 singles position gave Oklahoma a 4-3 win in the top-10 matchup Friday. The Tigers bounced back with a 4-1 victory over Arkansas in Fayetteville on Sunday.
Auburn enters the weekend with an 18-5 overall record and a 7-4 mark in SEC play, tied for the sixth-best record in the conference. The top four teams in the SEC standings will earn a double bye at the SEC Championship later this month.
Graduate student Ava Hrastar has been playing well for the Tigers, picking up two quality straight-set singles wins over the weekend against No. 103 Salakthip Ounmang of Oklahoma and Katarina Pavlechova of Arkansas.
Kentucky enters Friday’s match with a 9-10 overall record and a 3-8 mark in SEC play. The Wildcats suffered two home losses over the weekend to No. 2 Texas A&M and No. 15 Texas, dropping them to No. 46 in the latest ITA national team rankings. Despite the difficult weekend, Kentucky is typically a strong opponent on its home courts at 7-4 in home matches this season. The Wildcats have two ranked singles players: No. 60 Julia Zhu and No. 65 Zoe Hammond. Auburn trails the all-time series against Kentucky 26-19.
Tennessee moved up one spot in Tuesday’s ITA team rankings to No. 6 after defeating Texas and falling to Texas A&M over the weekend. The Volunteers are 14-4 overall and 8-3 in SEC matches. Auburn will look to avenge two 4-3 losses to Tennessee last season—one in the regular season and one in the SEC Championship. The Volunteers lead the all-time series against the Tigers 39-13.
Tennessee is led in singles by No. 7 Elza Tomaze, who holds an 11-6 dual-match record at the top singles position this season. Tomaze is 3-4 against players ranked inside the top 50 and will likely face Auburn’s third-ranked DJ Bennett on Sunday.
Live video and scoring for Auburn’s match against Kentucky will be available at ukathletics.com, while coverage for Sunday’s match against Tennessee will be available at utsports.com.