THIS WEEK: The Washington State Tennis team opens its 2022 fall season as they travel to Spokane to participate in the 2022 Gonzaga Invitational, Sept. 23-25 at the Stevens Center. Play begins for the Cougars at 1:30 p.m. Friday with doubles matches at Portland, followed by singles against New Mexico. Saturday’s the Cougars will face Gonzaga in doubles at 12:30 p.m. following by singles against Portland. Sunday’s schedule has WSU facing New Mexico in doubles at 11:30 a.m. followed by singles against Gonzaga.
ROSTER BREAKDOWN: For the 2022-23 season the Cougars will have two new players to accompany the six returners. The returning roster consists of fifth-year senior Yang Lee, junior Fifa Kumhom and sophomores Hania Abouelsaad, Stefaniia Mikhailova, Maxine Murphy and Elyse Tse. Joining the Cougar tennis program this year are freshmen Eva Alvarez Sande and Yura Nakagawa.
FALL SCHEDULE: In addition to the Gonzaga Invitational, the remaining events on Washington State’s Fall schedule include the Washington Invitational (Oct. 7-9), the ITA Northwest Regionals (Oct. 14-18) and the Baylor Invitational (Oct. 28-30).
BAYERLOVA BEGINS PROFESSIONAL CAREER: Last May Washington State’s Michaela Bayerlova capped her Cougar career by becoming the first All-American in program history after reaching the quarterfinals of the 2022 NCAA Singles Championship. As she began her pro career following graduation, she has not looked back, reaching a career-best world ranking of 370 earlier this week.
COACH RAQUEL ATAWO: Raquel Atawo begins her second season as head coach of the Cougars after being named to the position July 2, 2021. In Atawo’s first year leading Washington State Tennis, the Cougars showed great improvement throughout the season, finishing with a, 8-15 record, but posted back-to-back wins late in the season over nationally-ranked Washington. 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 at No. 10 world ranking in doubles.
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