BATON ROUGE — The LSU women’s tennis team continues its Southeastern Conference slate Sunday at noon when 12th-ranked Vanderbilt travels to Baton Rouge to face the Lady Tigers.
Match time was moved up from 1 p.m. to noon to accommodate Vanderbilt’s travel plans.
LSU owns a 7-4 record entering the match-up, but is yet to record an SEC win with an 0-3 conference mark.
The Lady Tigers are coming off a 6-1 loss to Kentucky on Friday. Three of LSU’s singles matches went to third sets, but the Wildcats captured wins on all three of those courts.
“We’re playing teams close within our matches, but we’re not pulling out those tight ones,” LSU head coach Tony Minnis said. “We need to win those three-set matches we play.”
The lone win came from freshman Mykala Hedberg, who defeated the Wildcats’ 42nd-ranked Kim Coventry in straight sets, 6-0, 6-2.
“I was very proud of how Mykala played Friday,” Minnis said. “She really came out strong at the beginning of her match and didn’t look back.”
Vanderbilt is 11-1 overall, boasting a perfect 3-0 start to conference play. The Commodores defeated Arkansas, 6-1, Friday to begin their weekend.
“Vanderbilt is a very good team,” Minnis said. “There’s a reason they’re ranked 12th in the country, and we’ll have to fight extremely tough if we want a chance to win that match.”
LSU dropped a close 4-3 contest to Vanderbilt in Nashville, Tenn., last year. That match broke a tie in the all-time series, which the Lady Tigers now trail, 15-14. Vanderbilt has held the upper hand of late, defeating LSU in eight straight meetings.
The Commodores, ranked twelfth as a team, also place two individuals in the top 50 in singles. Junior Amanda Fish lists at No. 23 while sophomore Taka Bertrand is 40th.