Furman tennis has wasted no time hitting the courts this semester. The ladies whooped Coastal Carolina 6-1, which is hopefully their first step towards a deep run in this year’s NCAA tournament.
“Our goal is to win conference and make it to NCAA’s like we did last year, but this year we have a tougher schedule to get our ranking as high as we can” said Aryn Green, a senior and team captain.
The Paladins dropped their match at Wake Forest 7-0, but bounced back with a hard-fought victory over Elon, defeating the Phoenix 4-3. Next up on the schedule is the University of Pennsylvania on Jan. 26th in the ITA Indoor Tournament in Athens, GA.
Two other big items on the schedule this year include a trip to Chicago to play both Illinois and DePaul and a flight to California to play San Diego State, UC San Diego and Long Beach State.
Fellow captain and sophomore Katerina Kozarov has faith that the team will reach these goals. “When we come together as a team, we make the perfect environment for improvement if we keep improving our work ethic and team culture, we can accomplish some really great things,” Kozarov said.
The men also have a tough season ahead of them. They started off strong at the Florida State Invite where they beat Florida Atlantic and North Florida before falling to Florida State.
Next on the docket is a long stretch in Greenville starting with Presbyterian on Feb. 7th and ending with Gardner-Webb on the 18th . They will finish the month by facing Duke and NC State.
Other key matches on the schedule are against Clemson on March 14th and the seniors’ last home competition on April 11th where the men’s team will have their senior day against SoCon rival, the Wofford Terriers.
Lastly, they’ll travel to Chattanooga to seek their biggest goal.
“Our goal is to keep getting better day by day, but the big overall goal is to win the SoCon this year,” said senior captain Cameron Green.
Look for the women's team to defend their SoCon title and for both teams to compete at the NCAA tournaments this spring.