Jayhawks Continue Homestand: Host No. 16 Baylor, No. 25 Texas

THE BASELINE 
Kansas women’s tennis continues its Big 12 homestand with a pair of matches against No. 16 Baylor on April 4, at 3:30 p.m., and No. 25 Texas on April 6 at noon in the Jayhawk Tennis Center.

The Jayhawks’ match against Texas marks Kansas’ final home match of the season and the program will honor seniors Claire Dreyer, Paulina Los and Dylan Windom.

LAST TIME OUT
After sweeping its first conference matches against Iowa State and West Virginia, Kansas returned home with a perfect conference record to be swept by No. 23 Oklahoma State and No. 18 Oklahoma.

Kansas opened the weekend on Friday, March 28 against the Cowgirls. The teams weathered the elements in the match, including a 15-minute suspension due to rain. The Cowgirls came out swinging in doubles as all three OSU teams swept Kansas on each court. It was the first time KU has been completely shut out in doubles. Oklahoma State continued its run into the singles competition where the Cowgirls took every court to give them a 7-0 win.

Kansas returned to the Jayhawk Tennis Center on Sunday, March 30 to host Oklahoma. Kansas fared better in doubles, where seniors Paulina Los and Dylan Windom defeated OU’s Emma Devine and Morgan Chumney at No. 2 doubles, 8-5. But the Sooners grabbed the two other courts to gain the early lead. Using the momentum from doubles, Oklahoma swept Kansas on every singles court to claim a 7-0 victory over the Jayhawks.

THE SERIES: KANSAS VS. BAYLOR
The Baylor Lady Bears lead the all-time series, 18-4. BU is on a 13-match winning streak over the Jayhawks. The last time Kansas topped Baylor was on March 30, 2002 when the Jayhawks ran past the Lady Bears, 5-2.

Last season, the 42nd-ranked Lady Bears hosted Kansas at the Hurd Tennis Center. Baylor topped Kansas, 5-2, after gaining the early advantage and downing four Jayhawks in singles. KU’s Luduena notched the team’s second victory over a ranked player when she defeated No. 120 Victoria Kisialeva, 5-6, 3-1, ret. The Jayhawks’ second win came from the fifth court where Anastasija Trubica defeated Maria Biryukova in another retired match, 6-3, 3-3, ret.

In the fall, senior Paulina Los met Baylor’s Viktoryia Kisialeva in her first match of the season at the Midland Invitational. Kisialeva rolled past Los, 6-2, 6-1, in the tournament’s  first round.

SCOUTING THE LADY BEARS
Baylor has gone 14-6 this year, suffering losses against No. 10 Texas A&M, No. 9 Vanderbilt, No. 7 Florida and No. 3 UCLA. The Lady Bears opened the dual season on a six-match win streak. Baylor is perfect in conference play, blanking both Iowa State and West Virginia.

Four of Baylor’s six singles players are featured in ITA Rankings, as of March 25. Leading the Lady Bear pack is No. 34 Kiah Generette, who has gone 10-6 at the No. 1 spot, and 19-10 on the year. No. 74 Ema Burgic made an appearance at No. 1 for Baylor in her last match, but boasts a 5-4 record at No. 2 singles and a 7-6 mark overall. Rounding it out for the Lady Bears, No. 48 Jordaan Sanford plays No. 3 singles and No. 103 Blair Shankle at No. 4.

In doubles, Shankle and partner Victoria Kisialeva have gone 10-3 at No. 1 doubles, and 19-5 this season. In the team’s last match against Memphis, Kisialeva teamed up with Sanford at No. 1, and Shankle paired up with Alex Clay on court two.

THE SERIES: KANSAS VS. TEXAS
Texas holds a commanding 25-0 all-time series lead over Kansas. The Texas-Kansas series dates back to the KU’s inaugural season in 1977 when the Jayhawks went on an 11-match, season-opening win streak before being shut out by the Longhorns, 9-0.

Then 29th-ranked Texas traveled to the Jayhawk Tennis Center last season. UT ran past the Jayhawks, 6-1, but Kansas notched two victories on the day. In doubles, the duo of Anastasija Trubica and Victoria Khanevskaya defeated UT’s Annat Rabinovich and Lana Groenvynck, 8-3. Trubica also grabbed a singles win on the fifth court over Groenvynck, 0-6, 6-2, 7-6 (9).

SCOUTING THE LONGHORNS
The Longhorns have gone 8-9 this season, but despite their losing record, Texas has notched impressive wins over ranked opponents. In January, UT knocked off currently-ranked No. 21 Auburn and No. 26 Rice.

The Longhorns are led by No. 18 Breaunna Addison, who has posted an impressive 20-8 record this season in singles. In dual play, Addison has gone 12-4, including a win over University of Southern California’s 15th-ranked Sabrina Santamaria. Playing at No. 2 singles is No. 114 Elizabeth Begley. Begley touts a 16-14 record on the year, including an upset over UCLA’s No. 16 Jennifer Brady.

In doubles, Addison and Begley recently paired up tout a 3-0 doubles record at the No. 1 court. The Longhorns also have a new No. 2 duo in Ratnika Batra and Neda Koprcina. The Texas pair have gone 2-2 together with wins over West Virginia and Iowa State.

SENIORS TAKE LAST HOMESTAND
Claire Dreyer, Paulina Los and Dylan Windom will take their final serves at the Jayhawk Tennis Center on Sunday as the Jayhawks complete their dual match schedule in Lawrence.

Dreyer, a transfer from Dayton in 2011, boasts an impressive 47-18 career record in singles, and a 39-24 record in doubles. In her final year, Dreyer has the best winning percentage in career singles (.723) of all Jayhawks this season.

Los, a native of Gdansk, Poland, has collected a 61-63 record in singles and 64-54 record in doubles during her four years as a Jayhawk. This season, Los rode a ten-match winning streak over dual play before falling to Katarina Adamovic of Oklahoma State last weekend.

Windom is 56-56 in singles and 59-48 in doubles for her career. After raking in eight Big 12 wins her first year as  Jayhawk, Windom tied Yuliana Svistun for seventh place in Kansas tennis’ all-time leader board for most Big 12 wins in a season.

THIS TIME, LAST YEAR
Last season, Kansas prepared to travel to then-No. 42 Baylor and No. 35 TCU. The matches followed Kansas’ heartbreaking 4-3 loss to in-state rival Kansas State and a drop out of the national rankings.

The Jayhawks first dropped a 5-2 match to Baylor, as Luduena and Trubica snagged their matches after their Lady Bear opponents retired. Kansas then traveled to Fort Worth, Texas, where the Jayhawks were blanked by the Horned Frogs, 7-0. KU’s only win of the day came from Los and Luduena at No. 2 doubles, but TCU was able to grab the first and third matches to win the point.

VINTAGE STOCK

• The then-unranked Jayhawks upset then-No. 36 Nebraska on the road, 4-3 in their dual season opener. The win was the largest upset for Kansas in ten years and only the third time in a decade KU defeated a top-50 team. Previously, Kansas defeated No. 46 New Mexico on March 9, 2008, and No. 48 Oklahoma on March 18, 2005.
• KU’s No. 33 ranking on March 3 was the highest ranking the Jayhawks have reached in program history.  The Jayhawks previously broke the record a week prior when they were pegged at No. 45; they debuted on the charts at No. 70 on Feb. 11.
• The Jayhawks were picked to tie Kansas State for seventh place in the Big 12 preseason poll, as voted by the conference coaches.
• Kansas opened its 2013-14 season on an eight-match winning streak before losing to current 34th-ranked Kentucky, 4-0. The Jayhawks’ opening run ties them for the second longest opening win streak since the program’s first season in 1977.
• To open the dual match season, senior Claire Dreyer went on a ten-match win streak before falling to Marcelina Cichon of No. 19 Tulsa on March 8.
• In TennisRecruiting.net’s Top 25 Women’s Recruiting Classes for the Class of 2014, Kansas’ recruiting class received 76 votes, leaving it just one spot (six votes) below the Top 25 and 32 votes ahead of the next-highest vote-getter.

KUAthletics.com: The official online source for Kansas Athletics, Williams Education Fund contributions, tickets, merchandise, multimedia, photos and much, much more.