Buckeyes Head to ITA Team Indoor Championship
2/6/2020 3:55:43 PM | Women's Tennis
COLUMBUS, Ohio – The No. 12-ranked Ohio State women’s tennis team will compete in the ITA Team Indoor Championship Friday through Monday at the XS Tennis Village in Chicago. The championship, hosted by Illinois, features free admission. Live scoring is available for all matches, with live video on select courts.
The Buckeyes are making their fifth appearance at ITA Team Indoors. The draw for the 2020 event was announced Tuesday. The Buckeyes are the No. 8 seed and will open play vs. Georgia Tech at 4:30 p.m. ET Friday. The OSU/GT winner will take on the winner of No. 1 seed Stanford vs. Michigan at 4:30 p.m. ET Saturday, with the non-advancing teams meeting at 7:30 p.m. ET Saturday in consolation play.
The other teams at the event include Texas, Arizona State, Virginia, Duke, North Carolina, North Carolina State, Pepperdine, UCLA, Princeton, Florida State, Georgia (who advanced after winning twice on ITA Kickoff Weekend) and host Illinois. The tournament is single-elimination, with each team guaranteed three matches.
The First Round Matchup
The Buckeyes are 3-0 on the season after notching two wins in Stillwater, Okla., for ITA Kickoff Weekend and defeating No. 5 Duke in the home opener last Friday. No. 22 Georgia Tech is 8-2, taking down Wisconsin and No. 13 South Carolina during its ITA Kick-Off Weekend. The Yellow Jackets are coming off losses against No. 3 Georgia and No. 7 Texas.
Ohio State is 4-4 all-time vs. the Yellow Jackets. The teams met twice last season. The first matchup came on Georgia Tech’s home court, a 4-0 Buckeye win as part of ITA Kickoff Weekend. Georgia Tech then prevailed, 4-3, in an NCAA Tournament first round match in Nashville May 3, 2019. The last neutral site match was a 4-2 Ohio State win in the NCAA Tournament Round 16 in 2016 in Tulsa.
In the Rankings
As a team, Ohio State moved from No. 25 in the ITA rankings to No. 12 after downing then-No. 24 Wake Forest and then-No. 10 Oklahoma State two weekends ago. No new ITA team rankings were released this week. In the first Tennis Channel/USTA College Tennis Top 25, the Buckeyes were ranked 11th and after beating Duke, the Buckeyes moved up to No. 8 this week.
In singles, three Buckeyes are in the ITA Top 125 rankings that were released Wednesday. Shiori Fukuda moved up from 11th to eighth. She is the first Buckeye in the Top 10 since Francesca Di Lorenzo in 2018.
Freshman Irina Cantos Siemers is in the 62nd spot and Danielle Wolf comes in at No. 99. This is the first time in the ITA singles Top 125 for the Buckeye senior.
Buckeye History at ITA Indoors
This year marks the Buckeyes’ fifth appearance at the ITA Team Indoor Championship.
- In 2019, with the schedule shortened by inclement weather to two matches, the Buckeyes fell to No. 3 seed Duke in the first round, 4-3, and topped Syracuse, 5-2, in consolation play.
- In 2017, the squad was seeded No. 6 and was 2-1 in New Haven, Conn., defeating No. 14 ranked Auburn and No. 5 ranked Oklahoma State, before falling to No. 2 ranked and No. 2 seed UNC in the semifinals.
- In 2016, the Buckeyes were seeded eighth. They defeated Fresno State and No. 1 ranked and defending NCAA champion Vanderbilt, 4-3, before the team’s run at the Championship ended on day three with a 4-3 loss to No. 6 ranked and No. 4 seed California.
- The 2001 team was the first to be invited and was 1-2 in Madison, Wis., falling to No. 7 Pepperdine (6-1) and No. 40 Oklahoma State (5-2) before a 5-2 win over No. 8-ranked UCLA.
Last Time Out
The Buckeyes defeated No. 5 Duke last Friday in their home opener. Ohio State redshirt-senior Danielle Wolf outlasted Duke’s Yasmine Mansouri 7-5 in a third-set tiebreak to lift the Buckeyes to a 4-2 win over the Blue Devils. The Buckeyes won the doubles point to start the match and then raced to a pair of quick singles victories, with wins from Kathleen Jones and Shiori Fukuda for a quick 3-0 lead. However, Duke clawed back and held off a number of match points to make the score 3-2. Wolf was able to clinch the team win off her serve and take down the Blue Devils for the first time in program history.
Buckeye This and That
- Shiori Fukuda is leading the Buckeyes in singles on the season, with an 18-4 overall record. In doubles, Danielle Wolf is first with nine overall wins, followed by Fukuda with eight.
- In dual match play, Fukuda is a team-best 3-0, with Wolf 2-0. In doubles, the duo of Wolf and Kathleen Jones is 3-0 to lead the way. Ohio State has a combined 10-4 singles mark and 5-4 record in doubles through the first three dual matches.
- Fukuda also claimed the first two Big Ten Athlete of the Week honors this season. She was first recognized after going 4-0 at the Michigan Invite, including two ranked singles wins and two doubles victories. She then notched two wins over Top 50 foes on court one at ITA Kickoff Weekend, including the match-clinching point vs. Oklahoma State.
- Jones posted her first collegiate dual match win vs. Duke, while Cantos Siemers notched a three-set victory vs. Oklahoma State for her first dual match victory as a Buckeye.
- Ohio State won the doubles point vs. Wake Forest and Duke, with 2-1 marks in both matches.
Up Next
After the ITA Team Indoor Championship, the Buckeyes will head to Nashville to face No. 13 Vanderbilt at noon Feb. 16. The match will have live video and stats available. Ohio State will return home the following weekend, hosting Kentucky at 5 p.m. Feb. 21 and Arizona State at 10 a.m. Feb. 23. Both matches will be in the Varsity Tennis Center, with free admission, as well as live video and scoring.
