Women’s Tennis to Open SEC Play at Home This Weekend

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Women’s Tennis to Open SEC Play at Home This Weekend

Bulldog Tennis Classic
Caroline Brinson (Photo by John Kelley)
[break] The No. 2 ranked Georgia women’s tennis team will open SEC play at home this weekend with a pair of matches against No. 45 LSU at 3 p.m. on Friday and Texas A&M at 1 p.m. on Sunday.

 

The Bulldogs defeated Georgia Tech 4-1 last weekend to finish the non-conference portion of their schedule with a 7-3 record.

 

This Friday, Georgia faces an LSU team that has not beat the Bulldogs since 1985. The Tigers are 8-3 this season but arrive on the back of a 1-6 loss to No. 36 Rice. LSU boasts two nationally ranked singles players in No. 38 Joana Vale Costa and No. 112 Skylar Kuykendall.

 

Friday’s match will be the SEC opener for both Georgia and LSU, who were picked in the SEC preseason coaches’ poll to finish No. 2 and No. 7 in the league, respectively.

 

Georgia leads LSU 38-4 in the all-time series and has won 32 straight matches against their SEC foe.

 

The Bulldogs are led by senior Lauren Herring, who shot all the way up to No. 6 in the ITA singles rankings after an impressive straight-set win over Georgia Tech’s No. 68 Johnnise Renaud last Saturday.

 

Herring is joined in the singles rankings by no less than six of her Bulldog teammates, with freshmen Hannah King (66), Kennedy Shaffer (69), Ellen Perez (74), and Mariana Gould (107), junior Silvia Garcia (97), and sophomore Caroline Brinson (111) also appearing in the ITA’s top-125.

 

In doubles, Georgia has two tandems ranked inside the top-25, with Garcia and Shaffer leading the way at No. 16, and Herring and Perez just behind at No. 25. The Bulldogs’ third duo, Brinson and H. King, is ranked No. 55.

 

Following Friday’s match against LSU, Georgia will have a day of rest on Saturday before returning to the Dan Magill Tennis Complex to face Texas A&M on Sunday. The Aggies are 2-2 this season but nearly defeated current No. 1 UNC on Feb. 1 (3-4 L). They will face Tennessee on Friday before making the trip to Athens. Georgia is a perfect 9-0 all-time against A&M.

 

Match notes, live results, and a live blog for the LSU match can be found by clicking the links at the top of the release. Links to the A&M match will be furnished in Friday’s recap of the LSU match. Updates and match-time information will also be available on the team’s Twitter (@UGAWomensTennis) and Facebook (Georgia Women’s Tennis) accounts.

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Greg is closing in on 15 years writing about and photographing UGA sports. While often wrong and/or out of focus, it has been a long, strange trip full of fun and new friends.