BATON ROUGE, La. — The LSU women’s tennis team (15, 5-4 SEC) jumped 16 spots to No. 25 in the latest ITA ranking after wins over Nicholls, No. 21 Ole Miss and No. 35 Mississippi State last week.
The Lady Tigers have won seven of their last 10 matches and are ranked in the Top 25 for the first time since the 2009 season. The weekend sweep over the Rebels and Bulldogs marked the first SEC weekend sweep since the 2009 season. The win over Ole Miss was also the highest ranked win under third-year head coach Julia Sell.
No. 39 Joana Vale Costa and No. 69 Skylar Kuykendall highlight the top of the LSU lineup. Kuykendall is on an eight-match win streak with five of the matches coming against ranked foes. Vale Costa has competed on court one all season and is 11-6 and 5-3 in conference play.
Skylar Holloway and Ella Taylor have sparked the team and have clinched the last three SEC matches. Holloway helped wrap up the win over No. 37 Auburn last Sunday. Taylor improved to 16-6 and 5-4 in conference play over the weekend. The Hampshire, England native clinched both matches in the SEC sweep.
LSU continues its four match road swing against Arkansas at 1 p.m. Friday at the Billingsley Tennis Center. The team then travels to Columbia, Missouri to face the Tigers at 12 p.m. Sunday.
Follow the Lady Tigers on Twitter @lsuwten and @LSUJuliaSell, on Instagram @LSUWTen and on www.Facebook.com/lsuwten.