Cowgirls Primed for ITA Indoor Championships

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STILLWATER – The fifth-ranked Oklahoma State women's tennis team makes its third-straight appearance at the ITA National Team Indoor Championships this weekend in New Haven, Conn.

Play at the event is scheduled to get underway Friday, as the third-seeded Cowgirls will take on Ole Miss at 9 a.m. ET.

Watch the Match Live
Fans can catch all of the action at the ITA National Indoor Championships live on FloTennis.com.

Oklahoma State from a Distance
Oklahoma State returns five contributing letterwinners from a 2015-16 campaign that saw the Cowgirls post the best finish in program history, earning the title of NCAA Runners-Up. Last season, OSU racked up a 29-5 record on the way to earning the program's first Big 12 Championship in 13 years, thanks in part to a 9-0 conference record.

The OSU roster is headlined by three standout seniors in Katarina Adamovic, Viktoriya Lushkova and Carla Tur Mari. Adamovic is coming off an impressive junior season that saw the Cacak, Serbia native earn her first ITA All-American honor by way of advancing to the NCAA individual quarterfinals last summer. A two-time All-American and the 2015 Big 12 Co-Player of the Year, Lushkova has been a key to the Cowgirls' unprecedented success as well, riding into the fall season on an 18-match win streak. Tur Mari provided a major boost to the back end of the OSU singles lineup in 2016, going 22-8 in the No. 6 spot.

Also returning for the Cowgirls are junior Vladica Babic and sophomore Katarina Stresnakova. Babic tallied six victories over ranked opponents in 2016, including a triumph over No. 28 Kennedy Shaffer of Georgia to help push the Cowgirls to a win over the Bulldogs in the NCAA Sweet 16. The highlight of Stresnakova's first season in Stillwater came in the NCAA Tournament, when the Slovakia product took down Ferny Angeles Paz of Ohio State in the NCAA quarterfinals to clinch the win over the Buckeyes and push the Cowgirls in to the national semifinals.

The Cowgirls boasted one of the most impressive doubles records in the country in 2016, winning all but one doubles point in 34 matches. With the level of talent set to return, that success figures to continue this upcoming season.

Head coach Chris Young enters his eighth season at the helm of the Cowgirl tennis program after earning his 100th win with the program last season. Young is assisted by second-year assistant coach Matt Manasse.

Notable Streaks and Trends
• The Cowgirls have spent 45 consecutive weeks in the ITA top 25, and six straight in the top 10. The last time OSU was outside the top 25 was March 18, 2014.
• The Cowgirls have won 20 or more matches in each of the last two seasons.
• Oklahoma State has won 14-straight regular season conference matches dating back to March 29, 2015, when the Cowgirls came up short, 4-3, at Texas Tech.
• Since 2012, OSU has made five-straight NCAA Tournament appearances. That streak is the second-longest in program history behind a 10-year streak that saw the Cowgirls earn NCAA Tournament berths from 1982-91.
• OSU has won 27-straight matches at the Greenwood Tennis Center, dating back to March of 2015.
• The Cowgirls were impressive this fall, racking up a 65-16 (.802) overall singles record and a 28-14 (.667) overall mark in doubles.
• That success has continued this spring, as OSU opened the 2017 dual season with five sweeps in its first six matches. The Cowgirls have combined to win 27 of their last 28 individual singles matches and 12 of their last 13 individual doubles matches.

Last Time Out
The fifth-ranked Oklahoma State women's tennis team won its sixth-straight match Sunday afternoon, as it knocked off Tulsa, 4-1, at the Michael D. Case Tennis Center to move to 6-0 on the season.

No. 5 Oklahoma State 4, Tulsa 1
Feb. 5, 2017 | Michael D. Case Tennis Center | Tulsa, Okla.
Doubles | Order of finish: 1, 3
No. 1: No. 11 Babic/Tur Mari (OSU) def. Laskutova/Okalova (TU) 6-3
No. 2: Leenabanchong/Matoula (TU) vs. Lushkova/Adamovic (OSU) 5-3, unf.
No. 3: Blanco/Ruppert (OSU) def. Cichon/Dadireddy (TU) 6-3

Singles | Order of finish: 6, 4, 5, 1
No. 1: No. 11 Viktoriya Lushkova (OSU) def. Ksenia Laskutova (TU) 6-4, 6-0
No. 2: R. Leenabanchong (TU) vs. No. 68 Katarina Adamovic (OSU) 2-6, 5-3, unf.
No. 3: Mahitha Dadireddy (TU) vs. No. 29 Vladica Babic (OSU) 4-6, 1-4, unf.
No. 4: No. 32 Carla Tur Mari (OSU) def. Martina Okalova (TU) 6-4, 6-2
No. 5: Martha Matoula (TU) def. No. 106 Sofia Blanco (OSU) 6-2, 6-3
No. 6: Lena Ruppert (OSU) def. Marcelina Cichon (TU) 6-1, 6-4

About the Event
Sixteen of the top Division I women's tennis teams are headed to New Haven, Connecticut, to compete in the 2017 ITA Division I National Women's Team Indoor Championship.

The four-day event, which begins on Friday, Feb. 10, 2017, takes place at two sites: the Cullman-Heyman Tennis Center and the Tennis and Fitness Center of Rocky Hill, with Yale University serving as the official event host. The University of California, Berkeley, is the defending National Indoors champion.

The ITA Division I National Women's Team Indoor Championship is in its 30th year of existence. Fifteen teams qualified for the event by winning their respective 2017 ITA Kick-Off Weekend four-team regional, while Yale received an automatic bid as the host site. The teams will compete in a single-elimination tournament over a four-day span to crown a national indoor champion. Each team is guaranteed three matches at the event.

The top eight seeds in the #ITAIndoors field were determined based on an unpublished ranking conducted by the National Ranking Committee. The remaining eight teams were placed into the draw by random selection. Teams were moved to avoid playing opponents in the first round already on their respective regular-season schedules.

First Round Schedule
No. 3 Oklahoma State vs. Ole Miss, 9 a.m. (RH)
No. 6 Ohio State vs. Auburn, 9 a.m. (Yale)
No. 2 North Carolina vs. Yale, 12 p.m. (Yale)
No. 7 California vs. Georgia Tech, 12 p.m. (RH)
No. 1 Florida vs. Michigan, 3:30 p.m. (Yale)
No. 8 Vanderbilt vs. Texas Tech, 3:30 p.m. (RH)
No. 4 Pepperdine vs. Texas A&M, 6:30 p.m. (Yale)
No. 5 Georgia vs. Duke, 6:30 p.m. (RH)

Tough February Tests Loom
After cruising through a 5-0 January, the Cowgirls' schedule will pick up dramatically in February, providing a number of tough tests.

OSU will not play a home match in the month of February, as the squad began the road gauntlet last weekend with a tough Tulsa team on the road. This week, the Cowgirls head to the ITA National Team Indoor Championships in New Haven, Conn., to match up with some of the nation's best in a championship tournament format.

The Cowgirls will wrap up the month with a weekend in the Sunshine State that will bring a couple of top-five showdowns. The weekend will begin in Lake Nona, Fla., where OSU will face No. 4 Stanford in a national championship rematch before heading to Gainesville for a match against the top-ranked Florida Gators.

Home Court Advantage
Since it opened for the 2013-14 season, the Michael and Anne Greenwood Tennis Center has proven a tough place to play for Cowgirl opponents. After an undefeated 18-0 mark at home last year, OSU has racked up a 42-2 overall record in the facility over the last three seasons.

Super Seniors
The experienced Cowgirl roster includes three seniors this season, all of which have been major contributors to the growth of the OSU women's tennis program. Katarina Adamovic, Carla Tur Mari and Viktoriya Lushkova have combined for 234 singles wins, 242 doubles wins, three All-America honors and 10 All-Big 12 accolades while helping the Cowgirls to a 74-20 dual record.

Starting on a High Note
The Cowgirls have wasted no time asserting their dominance in 2017, as the team opened the campaign with five consecutive shutouts for the first time in program history.

The team has combined for a 27-1 mark in dual play to begin the season, only surrendering three sets in those 28 contests. OSU has been impressive in doubles as well, going 12-1.

With last weekend's win, Oklahoma State has now opened the last three seasons at 6-0. It marks the 13th such start in program history. With a win Friday, OSU can record its first 7-0 start since the 1988-89 campaign, but the Cowgirls have a ways to go if they want to match the best start in program history of 18-0 that was set by former coach Ike Groce's squad during the 1980-81 season.

Record Watch
• Viktoriya Lushkova's .810 career win percentage in singles ranks second all-time in program history. She is the first player since Kate Vasylyeva in 2003 to break onto that list.
• With 86 career singles wins, Viktoriya Lushkova is currently third on the Big 12 era career list, and only 11 wins away from sealing the No. 1 spot. She is fifth on the doubles Big 12 era list with 79 career wins.
• With 79 career doubles wins, Katarina Adamovic sits in fifth on the program Big 12 era career doubles wins list. With a .798 win percentage in doubles, Adamovic's doubles win percentage leads the Big 12 era list in that category as well, along with Vladica Babic.
• With 84 career doubles wins, Carla Tur Mari is currently the program's active leader in that category, while also sitting in fourth in the Big 12 era program record book. She is also fourth in singles with 84 career wins.

Cowgirls in the Rankings
For the fourth-straight week, the Oklahoma State women's tennis team remained at No. 5 in the latest Intercollegiate Tennis Association team rankings released last week. With this week's rankings, the Cowgirls have been represented in the ITA top 25 for 44 consecutive weeks.

Viktoriya Lushkova (No. 10), Vladica Babic (No. 33), Carla Tur Mari (No. 42), Katarina Adamovic (No. 56), Sofia Blanco (No. 77) and Lena Rupper (No. 86) represent the Cowgirls the latest singles rankings released this week. Babic is ranked with Tur Mari at No. 5 in doubles, and with Adamovic at No. 21.

Young Guns
While the 2016-17 Cowgirl roster boasts plenty of experience, the young talent that head Coach Chris Young has brought on board over the last couple of seasons is evident as well, especially with a pair of newcomers.

Freshman Aliona Bolsova (Spain) joined the Cowgirls this fall after finishing one of the most decorated junior careers of any signee in Cowgirl history, having been been ranked as high as No. 4 in the ITF world junior rankings with a number of impressive wins under her belt.

Freshman Lena Ruppert (Germany) has been ranked as high as the No. 70 player in Germany, while recording five wins against players in the top-50. Ruppert came to OSU this fall rated as one of the top-10 players under the age of 18.

Impressively, the Cowgirl underclassmen (Bolsova, Ruppert, and sophomores Sofia Blanco and Katarina Stresnakova) have combined for a 55-14 record (.797 win pct.) so far this season.

Light it up, Lena
Freshman Lena Ruppert impressed in her first few dual weekends as a Cowgirl, winning each of her first five matches handily.

A deeper look into the numbers, however, shows an even more remarkable start for the German newcomer. In her opening four dual matches, Ruppert played a full 46 games before dropping one.

Ruppert figures to be a contributor in the Cowgirl lineup throughout the remainder of her freshman season, having posted a 14-2 overall singles record so far with a 5 -0 mark in duals.

Cowgirls Go International
The 2017 Oklahoma State women's tennis roster includes a variety of international flavors, with athletes hailing from eight different countries and three different continents. The Cowgirl roster boasts players from Serbia, Montenegro, Argentina, Spain, Ukraine, Germany, Slovakia and the United States.

OSU Tabbed for College MatchDay
The fifth-ranked Oklahoma State women's tennis team's matchup with No. 4 Stanford on Feb. 17 will be one of six matches broadcast live on ESPN3 as part of the United States Tennis Association's College MatchDay program, the organization announced Friday. The showdown between the Cowgirls and the Cardinal is a rematch of the 2016 NCAA Championship match, and will take place at the USTA National Campus at Lake Nona in Orlando, Fla.

Talent such as Patrick McEnroe, former Wimbledon finalist MaliVai Washington, Prim Siripipat and Kevin Corke will call the action live on the broadcasts.

The Cowgirls are familiar with College MatchDay, as the team has hosted the program in two of the last three years. During its first year on the air in 2014, the MatchDay crew traveled to Stillwater for a Bedlam match inside the Michael and Anne Greenwood Tennis Center. Fans around the country were treated to an epic match in which then-freshman Viktoriya Lushkova defeated senior Whitney Ritchie in a thrilling three-set match to seal up the victory for the Cowgirls. The program was also in Stillwater last season to cover the Cowgirls' conference victory over TCU that would lock up a share of the Big 12 title for Oklahoma State.

Cowgirl Picked to Repeat as Big 12 Championships
The Oklahoma State women's tennis team was unanimously picked No. 1 in a preseason poll of Big 12 coaches, it was announced by the league office last week.

The Cowgirls received 81 points in the poll, putting them 11 points ahead of second-place Texas Tech. Texas is ranked third with 63 points, while Baylor (52) and Kansas (50) round out the top five.

Next Event

Players Mentioned

Katarina Adamovic

Vladica Babic

Sofia Blanco

Aliona Bolsova

Viktoriya Lushkova

Lena Ruppert

Katarina Stresnakova

Carla Tur Mari

Oklahoma State University Athletics