Colorado State University Athletics
Thursday, April 21
Fort Collins, CO
1:00 PM
Colorado State
vs
Wyoming
Rams Cap Regular Season With Two Home Matches
4/19/2022 1:57:00 PM | Women's Tennis
Thursday’s Border War also serves as Senior Day for five Rams
FORT COLLINS, Colo. – Having played 15 consecutive matches on the road – four of them in Laramie – the Rams are feeling good about finally getting back on their home turf for competition.
Colorado State's women's tennis team will host rival Wyoming on Thursday (1 p.m.) and Nevada on Saturday (12 p.m.) to close out the regular season in Mountain West play. Thursday's match will serve as Senior Day for five Rams – Somer Dalla-Bona, Tracy Guo, Anastasiia Kotsyuba, Matea Mihaljevic and Lucia Natal.
"We want to celebrate the ones who are not returning and already done so much for the program in a short amount they've been here," first-year head coach Mai-Ly Tran said.
Saturday's theme is International Day, with matches slated to be played at the CSU Tennis Complex, weather permitting. If Saturday's match is forced indoors, it will be played at the Fort Collins Country Club with a 12:30 p.m. start.
The Rams need to win just one of the matches to secure the No. 3 seed for the upcoming Mountain West Tournament, played April 27-30 in Tucson, Ariz. The program has never been seeded higher than fifth for the conference tournament, but this has been a turnaround season for the program. The Rams are 12-7 overall, tied for the fifth-most dual matches won in a season, and are 6-2 in conference play, the most wins ever in a conference campaign, including tournament play.
The top five teams in the conference standings after this weekend will all earn first-round byes in the conference tournament, and Tran would like to see her team check off two boxes in one clean swoop on Thursday – beating their main rival and securing their tournament seeding.
"The match against Wyoming, the Border War, it's nice to finally play at home but also try to beat the last two conference teams. We want to beat Wyoming so bad, because they're a loud team and we've been in their home for four matches now," Tran said. "We're excited to play them and try to beat them. I feel the rivalry. We've seen them playing, and they're a competitive team and we're even with them. We're excited to have them at home."
The team most definitely is considering they haven't had a home match since facing Gonzaga at the Fort Collins Country Club on Feb. 11 – a stretch of 68 days between home appearances. Thursday's weather forecast calls for temperatures in the upper 70s, meaning it will be the first home match the team has played outdoors since April 18, 2021.
The Rams are 3-6 in true road matches, but 7-1 in neutral-court decisions.
"I was trying not to keep track of how many road matches we played," Tran joked. "The team has been road warriors and to finally be able to play on these courts will really be nice, especially in front of our fans. We're in a good place, but we want to continue our momentum going into the conference tournament, and to do that is finishing our last two matches at home and getting the best seed possible to set us up for the tournament."
Individually, the Rams are attacking the record book, too. Natal (17-3, .850 winning percentage) and Radka Buzkova (25-5, .821) currently rank first and second, respectively, for single-season winning percentage. Buzkova's 25 victories rank fourth in a season, and she and doubles partner Mihaljevic have 23 doubles wins to match the most in a single year by a player. Dalla-Bona and her doubles partner, Sarka Richterova, both have 19 wins, tied for ninth in a season.
Wyoming enters with an 8-7 record overall, 4-4 in MW play; Nevada is 8-8, 2-5. Both matches will feature live scoring and a live stream.
Colorado State's women's tennis team will host rival Wyoming on Thursday (1 p.m.) and Nevada on Saturday (12 p.m.) to close out the regular season in Mountain West play. Thursday's match will serve as Senior Day for five Rams – Somer Dalla-Bona, Tracy Guo, Anastasiia Kotsyuba, Matea Mihaljevic and Lucia Natal.
"We want to celebrate the ones who are not returning and already done so much for the program in a short amount they've been here," first-year head coach Mai-Ly Tran said.
Saturday's theme is International Day, with matches slated to be played at the CSU Tennis Complex, weather permitting. If Saturday's match is forced indoors, it will be played at the Fort Collins Country Club with a 12:30 p.m. start.
The Rams need to win just one of the matches to secure the No. 3 seed for the upcoming Mountain West Tournament, played April 27-30 in Tucson, Ariz. The program has never been seeded higher than fifth for the conference tournament, but this has been a turnaround season for the program. The Rams are 12-7 overall, tied for the fifth-most dual matches won in a season, and are 6-2 in conference play, the most wins ever in a conference campaign, including tournament play.
The top five teams in the conference standings after this weekend will all earn first-round byes in the conference tournament, and Tran would like to see her team check off two boxes in one clean swoop on Thursday – beating their main rival and securing their tournament seeding.
"The match against Wyoming, the Border War, it's nice to finally play at home but also try to beat the last two conference teams. We want to beat Wyoming so bad, because they're a loud team and we've been in their home for four matches now," Tran said. "We're excited to play them and try to beat them. I feel the rivalry. We've seen them playing, and they're a competitive team and we're even with them. We're excited to have them at home."
The team most definitely is considering they haven't had a home match since facing Gonzaga at the Fort Collins Country Club on Feb. 11 – a stretch of 68 days between home appearances. Thursday's weather forecast calls for temperatures in the upper 70s, meaning it will be the first home match the team has played outdoors since April 18, 2021.
The Rams are 3-6 in true road matches, but 7-1 in neutral-court decisions.
"I was trying not to keep track of how many road matches we played," Tran joked. "The team has been road warriors and to finally be able to play on these courts will really be nice, especially in front of our fans. We're in a good place, but we want to continue our momentum going into the conference tournament, and to do that is finishing our last two matches at home and getting the best seed possible to set us up for the tournament."
Individually, the Rams are attacking the record book, too. Natal (17-3, .850 winning percentage) and Radka Buzkova (25-5, .821) currently rank first and second, respectively, for single-season winning percentage. Buzkova's 25 victories rank fourth in a season, and she and doubles partner Mihaljevic have 23 doubles wins to match the most in a single year by a player. Dalla-Bona and her doubles partner, Sarka Richterova, both have 19 wins, tied for ninth in a season.
Wyoming enters with an 8-7 record overall, 4-4 in MW play; Nevada is 8-8, 2-5. Both matches will feature live scoring and a live stream.
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