ORLANDO – After two weeks off and three matches on the road, the UCF women’s tennis team returns home for a pair of matches against No. 20 Tennessee and Wisconsin Feb. 16 and 18, respectively. The contest against the Lady Volunteers has been deemed the ChargeOn Fund Knight, with first serve slated for 6 p.m. The Sunday match against the Badgers begins at 11 a.m. Both matches will be played at the USTA National Campus.
LAST TIME OUT
The Knights are coming off a difficult 4-2 loss to FIU Feb. 2. After dropping the doubles point, the squad bounced back to take two singles courts at the first and sixth position. Sophia Biolay earned her first ranked win of the season, taking a straight-set victory over No. 104 Oyinlomo Quadre at court one. Jaleesa Leslie also picked up a straight-set win with her first appearance at court six this season, a 6-2, 6-3 decision.
HOME SWEET HOME
The matches against No. 20 Tennessee and Wisconsin this weekend kick off a six-match home stand at the USTA National Campus that will conclude March 2. Having only played one match at home this season, the Knights are currently undefeated on home soil, sweeping No. 20 Georgia Tech 4-0 on opening day. Last season, the squad found early success at home, taking five of its first seven in Orlando, including two ranked wins over TCU and Penn State.
UCF will also take on its first night match of the season against the Lady Vols, with first serve at 6 p.m. Through the 2023 slate, the Knights were more successful when playing night matches with a 5-3 record, compared to a 6-9 record when playing at 3 p.m. or earlier.
SCOUTING TENNESSEE
The Lady Vols are 6-2 on the season and are fresh off a 7-0 clean sweep over East Tennessee State. The squad secured a ranked win over No. 25 Vanderbilt, 4-3, at the ITA Kickoff Weekend before dropping two in a row to No. 18 USC, 4-2, and No. 7 NC State, 4-3. Tennessee boasts a roster of four ranked singles players, No. 31 Sofia Cabezas, No. 83 Catherin Aulia, No. 94 Alana Wolfberg and No. 125 Lauren Anzalotta, and three ranked doubles pairings, No. 18 Cabezas and Esther Adeshina, No. 29 Cabezas and Elza Tomas and No. 52 Adeshina and Wolfberg. Tennessee holds the all-time series record, taking all four matches played between the two teams. Most recently, the squads went head-to-head during the 2023 season, where the Knights were narrowly edged by the Lady Vols in a 4-3 decision.
Head coach Alison Ojeda is in her eighth year at the helm and boasts a 127-62 record through her time with the Big Orange. This will be the first road match of the season for the squad, coming off an eight-match home stand on Rocky Top. The Lady Vols have also claimed seven doubles points throughout the season, dropping only one all season, as well as four shutout victories.
SCOUTING WISCONSIN
Wisconsin is 5-2 on the 2024 campaign, coming off a big 5-2 win over Notre Dame last Sunday. After picking up its fifth doubles point of the season, the squad won singles matches at positions one, three, four and five to secure its second consecutive win. The Badgers are home to the 49th-ranked doubles pairing of Alina Mukhortova and Xinyu Cai, the 68th-ranked singles player in Maria Sholokhova and the 121st-ranked singles player Cai. This will be just the fourth time the squads have met, with Wisconsin holding the all-time series record 2-1. The last time the teams saw each other on the courts was in 2008 when the Badgers took the match 5-2.
Kelcy McKenna entered her eighth season as the head coach at Wisconsin at the beginning of the 2024 season. The Oregon native holds an 89-67 record in Madison and has taken her squad to two NCAA Tournament appearances, including a second-round trip last year after finishing 20-7. The Badgers have played the majority of their matches on the road or at neutral sites, only hosting two matches so far.