Women's Tennis Takes on #19 Notre Dame, DePaul
Apr 01, 2011 | Women's Tennis
April 1, 2011
NOTRE DAME, Ind. - The Texas A&M women's tennis team takes a break from Big 12 Conference play to take on No. 19 Notre Dame and DePaul, Saturday and Sunday, respectively, in Notre Dame, Ind.
Both matches will be played at the Eck Tennis Pavilion with first serve against the Fighting Irish slated for 12 p.m. (1 p.m. EDT), and the match against DePaul beginning at 8 a.m. (9 a.m. CDT). Live scoring of the matches will be available at AggieAthletics.com.
The Aggies are 9-4 overall and 3-2 in the Big 12 after going 1-1 last weekend. A&M fell to current-No. 31 Kansas State, 5-2, in Manhattan last Saturday and then rebounded with a 6-1 victory over Kansas in Lawrence on Sunday.
Sophomore Nazari Urbina (Xalapa, Veracruz, Mexico) leads the Aggies with a 21-7 singles record, including a 9-4 record at the No. 1 position. She is A&M's highest nationally ranked singles player at No. 34.
Morgan Frank (Oldsmar, Fla.) is 17-5, including 11-2 in dual matches at the No. 2 line, and is tied for the team lead with a four-match winning streak. The senior is 82-26 in her career, needing one more victory to tie former Aggie All-American Jessica Roland (2001-04) for 10th in the A&M career records.
Stephanie Davidson also is riding a four-match winning streak and has won eight of her last nine matches in singles, seeing action at both the No. 5 and 6 lines. The senior from Fair Oaks Ranch, Texas, also has won four straight matches in doubles with Sheri Olivier (Topeka, Kan.), and 11 of her last 12 matches overall to give her 91 wins in her career, putting her within one of tying former Aggie standout Nancy Dingwall (1994-97) for sixth place in the A&M all-time records.
No. 19 Notre Dame is 9-8 entering a Friday match against No. 44 Long Beach State. Most recently the Irish fell to No. 21 Georgia Tech, 5-2, in Atlanta, Ga., to drop to 4-7 on the year against nationally-ranked opponents.
Notre Dame is led by senior Kristy Frilling, who is ranked No. 3 in the nation in singles and boasts a 13-1 record the No. 1 line. Shannon Matthews is No. 63 in singles and Jennifer Kellner comes in at No. 105. In doubles, Frilling and Mathews are No. 22.
DePaul is 10-7 entering a home match against Long Beach State on Saturday. All seven of DePaul's losses have come against ranked opponents, including five against opponents that have been ranked in the top 31 at the time of competition.
The Blue Demons' doubles team of Katarina Milinkovic and Gia McKnight is ranked No. 75 in the nation.
The Aggies are 1-7 all-time against the Fighting Irish, with the only win coming in the teams' first meeting in 1990. The teams met last year with sixth-ranked Notre Dame escaping with a 4-3 victory in College Station.
A&M and DePaul will be meeting for the first time.
The match against DePaul concludes a four-match road swing for the Aggies, who return to the George P. Mitchell Tennis Center and Big 12 play Friday, April 8 against 22nd-ranked Oklahoma at 6 p.m.
