CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas – The Texas A&M-Corpus Christi tennis teams start the 2026-27 season off with the biggest event on their fall calendars, starting the year off by hosting the Jake Frederick Memorial Islander Open at the Thomas J. Henry Tennis Center.
The tournament will run all day on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, with the action getting underway at 8:30 a.m. on each day. Prior to the start of the opening day, there will be a ceremony that begins at 8 a.m., which will both honor the life of Jake Frederick and remember the 25
th anniversary of the September 11
th attacks.
Jake Frederick was an Islanders Tennis player who joined the team in 2002 and later became an F-18 Marine pilot. Jake was beloved in the Corpus Christi community as he and his brother, Joe Bob, played tennis for the Islanders and went on to become Marine pilots! Sadly, in 2016, Jake gave his life for his country during a flight over the Pacific Ocean near Japan.
"This tournament is named after one of the great men to ever live in the Corpus Christi community," Islanders head coach
Steve Moore said. "Jake was a great tennis player, father, and husband, and he was beloved in the community. He was one of the highest character and courageous young men I've ever met in my life, and he lifted up everyone around him with his heart, faith and life example."
This year, A&M-Corpus Christi will compete against numerous strong opponents throughout the state of Texas, with the field consisting of Abilene Christian, UTSA, and Southland Conference rivals UIW, Lamar and UTRGV.
The tournament page on the ITA website can be found
here.
A&M-Corpus Christi Tennis
- 38 Southland Conference Championships
- 18 NCAA Tournament appearances
- 15 Southland Conference Coach of the Year Awards (Most in conference history, any sport)
- Four Top-40 national rankings
- Three NCAA Tournament No. 3 seeds
- National ranking as high as No. 35 (men)
- National ranking as high as No. 60 (women)
- Men's program nationally ranked for 10 consecutive seasons
- Women's program ranked in the ITA Top 75 three times
- 47 consecutive semesters with a team GPA above 3.0
- More than $1.6 million raised to support the program
#ShakasUp
