BATON ROUGE — The LSU women’s tennis team will make up its previously postponed match with Houston on Wednesday at noon when the Cougars travel to Baton Rouge for a midweek clash.
The Lady Tigers stand at 6-1 on the year headed into this final tune-up before conference play begins with matches at Tennessee and Georgia this weekend.
“Matches like this are huge, because to make the NCAA Tournament you have to have quality wins,” he said. “That’s why we schedule these tough out-of-conference schools, to get an opportunity to get some good wins for our resume.”
The Cougars’ record mirrors the Lady Tigers’, as they are also 6-1 on the year having won their last two matches against Sam Houston State and Texas-San Antonio by 5-2 margins.
The other statistic they share with the Lady Tigers is that their only loss came against Texas A&M as well. They fell to the Aggies, 5-2, in College Station on Feb. 4. But they also captured a quality win when they upset Southeastern Conference member and then-No. 33 Mississippi State, 5-2, in Starkville, Miss., just days before that.
“They’re a good team who upset Mississippi State not too long ago,” Minnis said. “We won a tight 4-3 match against them last year and we have to go into this expecting a battle because that’s what it’s going to be.”
The Lady Tigers are 12-2 overall against the Cougars in the all-time series, including the 4-3 win last year at Houston. In fact, LSU has won the previous six meetings.
Both LSU and Houston have witnessed success on the doubles courts this year. The Lady Tigers have only lost the early point once — in the loss to Texas A&M — while the Cougars are yet to drop the doubles decision in dual-match play this season.
“Doubles has been really impressive to this point,” Minnis said. “We have two new teams who are still gelling together, so hopefully we can continue playing with the same intensity and keep it up.”
The only ranked individuals from these teams are LSU’s Lauren Seaman and Tiffany Tucker, who list at No. 35 as a pair by the ITA. They will look to get back on track as the duo lost its first match Saturday against Lamar.