Cougars Open 2025 Dual Match Season by Hosting UC Davis Saturday

THIS WEEK: The Washington State Tennis team begins its 2025 dual match season Saturday, Jan. 11, by hosting UC Davis at the Simmelink Tennis Courts at Hollingbery Fieldhouse. Match time against the Aggies is set for 11 a.m. Free donuts will be available for fans in attendance.
 
SCOUTING UC DAVIS: The Aggies open their 2025 spring schedule at Washington State before facing Eastern Washington Sunday in Cheney. Last season, UC Davis finished with a 12-13 record, 4-5 in Big West Conference play. Saturday’s match marks just the second between the two schools in program history, the first coming during the 1994 season, a 6-3 WSU win in San Francisco. Current Cougar Head Coach Raquel Atawo began her coaching career as a volunteer assistant coach at UC Davis for the 2017 spring season.
 
COUGARS TO PLAY IN WEST COAST CONFERENCE: For the 2024-25 and 2025-26 seasons, the Cougars will be affiliate members of the West Coast Conference. When conference realignment impacted the Pac-12 Conference following the 2023-24 season, Cougar Tennis was one of 10 WSU athletic programs to become WCC affiliate members for the next two years.
 
NEXT UP: Following this weekend’s match, the Cougars will host a doubleheader against Idaho (10 a.m.) and Eastern Washington (3 p.m.), Friday, Jan. 17 at Hollingbery Fieldhouse.
 
ROSTER BREAKDOWN: For the 2024-25 season, the Cougars have three freshmen to accompany the six returners. The roster consists of seniors Hania Abouelsaad and Elyse Tse, juniors Maxine Murphy, Eva Alvarez Sande, Yura Nakagawa, sophomore Martina Markova and freshman Chisato Kanemaki, Martina Puvill and Madhu Satishbabu.
 
COACH RAQUEL ATAWO: Raquel Atawo is in her fourth season as head coach of the Cougars after being named to the position July 2, 2021. Atawo arrived in Pullman having spent the 2021 season as the assistant coach at Auburn and prior to that, spent 15 years on the WTA Tour, where she reached No. 10 world ranking in doubles.
 
FOLLOW LIVE: For all Cougar home tennis matches at Hollingbery Fieldhouse, live video streams of each match can be found HERE while live scoring is available HERE.
 
FOLLOW THE COUGARS: Keep up with Washington State tennis by following @WSUCougarTennis on Twitter, @wsucougartennis on Instagram, and Washington State Cougar Tennis on Facebook.