The Texas A&M - Corpus Christi tennis teams will see their
first action of the fall this weekend as the program hosts the
Second Annual Islanders Open, an officially-sanctioned ITA fall
tournament. The tournament will be hosted in its entirety at the
HEB Tennis Center.
"We're very happy to be hosting an official ITA fall tournament
here," said Director of Tennis Steve Moore. "It's something we have
wanted to do for a long time; bring an officially sanctioned ITA
tournament to Corpus Christi.
"It's a tremendous benefit for our student-athletes to play at
home, and it's great for the Corpus Christi tennis community."
On the women's side, the Islanders will play host to members
from the Rice, Houston, Lamar, Texas-Pan American and Abilene
Christian teams. The men's bracket will have players from
Texas-Pan American, Abilene Christian and Tyler Junior College
taking part.
The tournament begins on Saturday morning and will run through
Monday. The first matches will begin at 9:00 a.m. on Saturday with
singles. There will be another round of singles starting at 2:00
p.m. that day before the start of doubles action at 5:00 and 7:00
p.m. to close out the first day.
On Sunday, singles action picks back up at 9:00 a.m. and will
run throughout the day. In addition to the elimination tournament,
all players that lose in the first round will play a consolation
bracket as well.
The finals will be on Monday morning, once again beginning at
9:00 a.m. and lasting until a champion is crowned.
The winner of the women's draw last year was Mirna Cicak. The
Islanders junior will be returning to defend her title along with
newcomers Mia Matuszak, Sandra Bruges, Stefania Nicolae and Ashley
Garza.
Matuszak is a sophomore transfer from Katy that played at Texas
Tech and is a former top 10 juniors player in Texas. Bruges is a
freshman from Spain while Nicolae is a freshman from Romania. Both
players were ranked in the top 60 of their country, including all
juniors, adult and professional players. Garza is a local talent
who is a native of Corpus Christi and played at Carroll High
School.
"We are very high on these new girls, they have worked extremely
hard in practice so far, are very high level players and have great
attitudes," said Moore. "I think I can safely say it's the
strongest group of newcomers we have ever had.
"These girls fit into the Islanders culture of hard work and
over emphasis on the team aspect very well. Just like always, it
boils down to one thing, how hard we work and how much we improve
every day. That's been our focus so far."
On the men's side Laurent Montoisy, the Islanders No. 1 player
who redshirted last season, will be playing in his first tournament
since 2009. He will be joined by newcomers Aurelien Tave and Matt
Westmoreland.
Tave is a junior transfer from France who played No. 1 singles
for Troy last season when they won the Sun Belt Conference
Championship. Westmoreland is a freshman who comes to the Island
University from the Hawaiian Islands.
"We're very excited about these guys joining our team and we are
expecting great things from them," said Moore. "They have a very
bright future here if they show up to work hard every day."
