BATON ROUGE — The LSU women’s tennis team garnered its third exceptional recruit of the fall signing period on Monday, as the Lady Tiger coaching staff announced the signing of Jessica Ferguson for the 2002-2003 season.
“Jessica will be a big help for our program,” said 11th-year head coach Tony Minnis. “She has shown the ability to compete and has been able to beat some of the nation’s top players. She brings the experience of playing the No. 1 position in the Big 12 Conference and will definitely be a vital asset to our program in the immediate future.”
Ferguson, who was named to the All-Big 12 Conference team as a freshman at Missouri in 2001, is currently the top player at Tyler Junior College in Tyler, Texas. She will complete her sophomore season at Tyler Junior College and then transfer to LSU in the fall of 2002.
As a freshman at Missouri, Ferguson ended the season with an impressive 19-12 overall record at the No. 1 and No. 2 singles positions and knocked off two of the nation’s top-100 ranked players. She recorded wins over SMU’s 52nd-ranked Dee Dee Herring and No. 82 Alena Jecminkova of Kansas State during the 2001 campaign.
Ferguson, LSU’s third signee of the fall signing period, will also play a major role in the doubles competition for the Lady Tigers. She accumulated a 14-6 overall doubles mark for Missouri in 2001.
She will join both Daysi Espinal and Erin McGill on the court during the 2002-2003 season. McGill, the Lady Tigers’ highly-touted recruit from Tara High School in Baton Rouge, is the 26th-ranked high school player in the nation, while Espinal is the top-ranked singles player in the Dominican Republic.
The LSU women’s tennis team will open its 2002 season on January 11, as the Lady Tigers head to Williamsburg, Va., to compete in the William and Mary Invitational.