The Texas A&M’s women’s tennis team will return to TCU’s Bayard H. Friedman Tennis Center this weekend to participate in the Haunted Horned Frog Classic.
Tournament play begins on Friday, Oct. 27 and will wrap up on Sunday, Oct. 29. The Aggies will compete against TCU, Rice, Baylor, and Middle Tennessee State.
This is A&M’s fourth tournament of the fall. The Aggies’ last tournament took them to TCU, where they participated in the five-day ITA Texas Regional Championships starting on Friday, Oct. 13.
“Overall it was a good tournament,” Mark Weaver, head women’s tennis head coach, said. “We’re just trying to keep getting better and better every day. We learned a lot of things that we’ve been working on in practice and are definitely striving to improve on. Hopefully that will pay off this weekend, and if not, I know that it will pay off soon.”
The tandem of Domenica Gonzalez and Eva Paalma saw their first fall action as they defeated a duo from Incarnate Word in doubles action on Saturday to advance into the doubles main draw quarterfinals on Sunday. Both Aggies were returning from injuries that kept them off the court in the previous two tournaments.
“Domenica had a foot surgery this summer, so even though she only competed in doubles, it was nice to see her back on the court,” Weaver said. “Eva had had a bit of an injury right before then as well, so those were two areas of concern for us and it was encouraging to see them have a good run in the doubles.”
Dorthea Faa-Hviding was the lone Aggie to compete on Monday, advancing to the singles consolation semifinal round before falling 6-2, 6-3 to Savannah Durkin from Rice.
The tournament this weekend is in a format that is familiar to the Aggies, though they usually experience it in the spring. Rather than the typical fall-style tournament where the players are thrown into a draw, this tournament will feature more of a team-vs-team format, which helps foster the team atmosphere.
“I think there is generally more pressure when you feel like you’re playing for your team,” Weaver said. “They’ll get a little bit of flavor for that this weekend. That’ll definitely give us some experience before we start the spring season.”