The Illinois women’s tennis team will travel to College Station, Texas to face No. 18 Texas A&M on Friday and treck to Waco, Texas to face Baylor on Sunday. 

The team is 3-4 overall so far this season and is coming off of a three-loss weekend at the ITA Tennis Indoor National Championships. Illinois will have an opportunity to rebound and return to a winning record if the team wins both matches this weekend.

This weekend will mark the team’s first away matches of the spring season. Last year, Illinois went 4-5 on the road. 

According to head coach Evan Clark, the Illini will continue to emphasize consistency as they embark on their first out-of-state trip. 

“I think at the end of the day it’s about being consistent throughout the match,” Clark said. 

Illinois has shown flashes of excellence in big matches, such as when the Illini clinched the doubles point and earned the lead in singles matches early on in their match against No. 5-ranked Duke. Illinois’ issue has been maintaining strong play for entire matches against top-ranked teams, where there’s less room for error. 

Illinois is 3-0 against unranked teams, but 0-4 against top-10-ranked teams so far this season. The Illini will have an opportunity to improve against nationally-ranked opponents against No. 18-ranked Texas A&M on Friday. 

Clark said the issue of inconsistency was especially pervasive last weekend against top competition when Illinois lost all three matches against top-10-ranked teams. 

“If you look at all three matches, we were good at times,” Clark said. 

The team will look to make moments of good play last for the entirety of this weekend’s matches.

@WesHollenberg

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