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Mountaineers Ready For 2017 Season
January 17, 2017 02:42 PM | Tennis
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – With eight experienced returning letter winners and three promising newcomers, the West Virginia University tennis team is poised to take the next step under fourth-year head coach Miha Lisac.
The 2017 squad, led by lone senior Kaja Mrgole, has depth and experience in singles and doubles play that will transfer to wins on the court. However, the wins will not come easily as the 2017 schedule promises to be one of the toughest in program history.
The grueling schedule features eight teams that made the NCAA Tournament in 2016, with six of them getting past the first round and one falling in the national championship game. The schedule also features eight teams that were ranked in the top 40 of the final 2016 Oracle/ITA rankings.
Academic Excellence
The Mountaineers have a history of excellence in the classroom. They averaged a 3.49 GPA in the fall of 2016 and every student-athlete made the All-Academic Big 12 Team last year. Lyn Yuen Choo, Carolina Lewis, Mrgole and Habiba Shaker garnered first team honors, while Yvon Martinez earned second team accolades and Paula Goetz, Abigail Rosiello and Kirsten White donned rookie team honors. Additionally, Goetz, Mrgole, Rosiello and Shaker were named ITA Scholar-Athletes and WVU was named an ITA All-Academic team for the third year in a row.
Mountaineers Worldwide
Now in his fourth season at the helm of the Mountaineer tennis program, head coach Miha Lisac, a native of Velenje, Slovenia, has put together a roster comprised of student-athletes from around the world. The 11 Mountaineers hail from six different countries, including five different continents.
Junior Lyn Yuen Choo, a native of Kuching, Sarawak, Malaysia, traveled the farthest distance to West Virginia University, coming from approximately 9,225 miles away. Junior Habiba Shaker, who hails from Cairo, Egypt, traveled approximately 5,914 from her hometown to the Mountaineer Tennis Courts.
Senior Kaja Mrgole and sophomore Paula Goetz are the two Europeans on the roster. Mrgole is from Jesenice, Slovenia, and Goetz is a Rottenburg am Neckar, Germany, native. Newcomer Sofia Duran (Guayaquil, Ecuador) is the lone South American on the 2016-17 roster.
In addition to international student-athletes, Lisac has also been able to bring in homegrown talent. Three Mountaineers (Abigail Rosiello, Makenzie Stolar and Kirsten White) are natives of the Mountain State. Rosiello and Stolar hail from Morgantown, while White is a Charleston native.
The remaining three Mountaineers come from various locations in the United States. Jordan is a product of Detroit, Michigan. Lewis is a native of Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, and Martinez hails from Wexford, Pennsylvania.
Fresh Faces
Three members of the 2017 squad, freshmen Christina Jordan and Sofìa Duran and redshirt sophomore Makenzie Stolar, will make their spring tennis debuts wearing the old gold and blue
in 2017.
Jordan attended the prestigious Montverde Academy in Montverde, Florida, where she was named the Eagles’ Most Valuable player in 2015 and 2016. A four-star recruit, and rated No. 87 in the country by tennisrecruiting.net, Jordan brings plenty of promise to the Mountaineers.
“Christina brings great potential to the program,” Lisac said. “She has the ability to take off over the next couple of years and make a push towards competing against the top players in the conference.”
Duran joins the Mountaineers by way of Guayaquil, Ecuador, where she was ranked as Ecuador’s second-best player by the International Tennis Foundation on ITFTennis.com. Duran brings a vast amount of experience after playing on the ITF Junior Circuit. Her older sister, Pamela, competed in the ITF circuit and reached her highest ranking of No. 172 in the world in 2005.
“It will be an adjustment for Sofia, being with the program and getting used to everything,” Lisac said. “She brings a lot of potential. She is someone that can do very well in our program.”
Stolar, a Morgantown native, comes to WVU after spending the past two seasons at Cincinnati. She will have three years, including the 2016-17 season, of eligibility remaining. She did not compete the last two seasons due to injuries
During her prep career, Stolar was ranked as West Virginia’s No.2 tennis recruit, and the 15th- best in the Mid-Atlantic region by Tennisrecruiting.net. Stolar competed on the USTA Junior circuit, where she earned the Mid-Atlantic West Virginia Sportsmanship Award.
“Makenzie is a native of Morgantown and brings a tremendous drive to make a push and add to the program on and off the tennis courts,” Lisac said. “Makenzie is someone who will make the program better through her everyday approach and challenge us to step up in preparation on the courts and success in the classroom.”
Stolar’s family ties are rooted deep at WVU as her mother, Lisa, played basketball from 1981-85, and was an assistant coach under Kittie Blakemore and Scott Harrelson from 1986-95.
Doubles Outlook
Doubles play promises to be one of the deepest areas of the roster for the Mountaineers. In the fall WVU was led by the tandem of Shaker and Jordan, who participated in the Riviera ITA All-American Championships marking the first time a doubles pair participated in the tournament in the Miha Lisac era.
Shaker has recorded a team-leading 39 wins in doubles action in her career, followed by Mrgole with 38 wins. Lewis posted a 6-1 record in the fall season in doubles play to lead all other Mountaineers.
Singles Outlook
With the loss of Hailey Barrett to graduation, junior Shaker is poised to make the step into the No.1 slot for the Mountaineers. In 2016, Shaker went 2-3 at the number one position and went a perfect 10-0 while competing on the No.2 court. Shaker holds an astounding 44-17 record in singles play in her career, ranking No. 20 on the all-time singles win list in program history.
The rest of the roster looks to build on the experiences that they have built through playing in one of the country’s premier conferences, the Big 12. Five Mountaineers have won more than 25 matches in their singles careers.
Tough Schedule
The Mountaineers face what is sure to be one of the toughest schedules in program history in 2017. Comprised of eight 2016 NCAA Tournament qualifiers, including the national runner-up- Oklahoma State, WVU will face daunting tasks each and every week throughout the spring.
“It is an opportunity for them to jump through the invisible walls that have been created here for years,” assistant coach Emily Harman said. “The cool part is that they have an opportunity to do that and prove themselves week in and week out. That is what we are all about, we are playing with a chip on our shoulder.”
WVU will kick off the tough slate of matches for the third year in a row with the Backyard Brawl at rival Pittsburgh on January 21. The Mountaineers hold a 28-6 record against the Panthers, in a series that started in 1975.
The nonconference schedule also includes bouts at Penn State, VCU, William & Mary, Buffalo, and Indiana. March 4 will be the first time in school history that the Mountaineers will face the Hoosiers.
WVU will host four nonconference matches kicking on the first weekend, with two matches against Akron on Saturday, January 28. The Mountaineers lead the series with the Zips 9-4 and won in Akron in 2016, 5-2. The following day, WVU will host border rival Maryland. The Terrapins got the better of the Mountaineers in 2016, defeating them 5-2 in College Park, Maryland.
Following a three-match road trip, WVU will host Virginia Tech on Saturday, February 18. The Hokies ranked No. 38 in the final 2016 Oracle/ITA rankings.
The following day, the Mountaineers will host Marshall in a battle for the Mountain State. The Thundering Herd narrowly edged out the Mountaineers in 2016, 4-3. WVU leads 21-17 in a series that stretches back to the program’s first season in 1974, where the Mountaineers won the first match, 3-1.
Conference play features the most difficult part of the schedule. Six of the nine teams the Mountaineers will face in Big 12 action made it to the 2016 NCAA tournament, with five of them making it past the first round.
“The bar has been established in the Big 12 by many programs for many years,” Lisac said. “They are good programs. We are always going to respect what teams have done so far in the Big 12 conference.”
The Mountaineers will open conference play on March 11 in Ames, Iowa, as they take on Iowa State. The squad will then make a swing through Kansas to take on Kansas on March 24 and Kansas State on March 26.
WVU will open Big 12 play in Morgantown on March 31 when they take on NCAA third round participant Texas. The following four matches feature the most grueling part of the schedule for the Mountaineers as they face four teams that were ranked No. 32 or higher in the final 2016 Oracle/ITA rankings, including a matchup with Oklahoma State, the 2016 national runner-up, in Morgantown on April 21.
Senior Kaja Mrgole will be honored before the final match of the season against Oklahoma on April 23. WVU will then travel to Norman, Oklahoma, for the Big 12 Championship that will be held April 27-April 30.
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