AUBURN, Ala. – The Auburn women's tennis team closes out the non-conference portion of their schedule Saturday morning when the Tigers welcome North Florida to the Yarbrough Tennis Center. Match time is set for 11 a.m. CT.
Saturday's match will be played indoors, and access to the facility will be strictly limited to participating student-athletes, coaches and officials. Live scoring will be available at AuburnTigers.com; live video will not be available.
The match was originally scheduled for Jan. 24 in Jacksonville, then postponed to Saturday. Weather concerns in Jacksonville this weekend prompted officials to move the match to Auburn, where indoor facilities would be available.
"(North Florida) is a veteran team," Auburn head coach Caroline Lilley said. "They're very experienced, they fight incredibly hard. From what I understand, they're really tough, they make a lot of balls, they make you fight for every single point. I expect an absolute dogfight. Similar to Clemson, Georgia Tech and some of the more recent matches we've had, we're definitely in for a fight.
"Looking back (at last season), I felt like we were not prepared (for SEC play) based on our non-conference segment. This year, I made a deliberate effort to improve our non-conference segment. We should be playing the most difficult schedule that we can. We have a team that can handle that, and it prepares us for conference."
Auburn (4-1) is coming off a 4-3 road victory at Clemson last Sunday that saw the Tigers rally from dropping the doubles point to pick up four singles victories and secure the team win. Auburn got singles wins from Selin Ovunc, Carolyn Ansari, Georgie Axon and Adeline Flach to claim their fourth dual match win of the spring.
"Any road win is not easy," Lilley said. "They had quite a few people there, so it was definitely a hostile environment. I loved how we closed out some matches and fought back after losing some first sets. I thought that showed a lot of resilience."
North Florida (3-0) enters the weekend with victories over Flagler, Georgia Southern and South Florida to their credit. The Ospreys are scheduled to face Florida State in Tallahassee Friday afternoon before traveling north for Saturday's match.
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Auburn hosts North Florida to close non-conference play
