Only a few more competitions remain for Illinois women’s tennis, who head to Fort Worth, Texas this weekend for TCU’s Jae Foundation Invitational. This is the final fall action for four Illini, as all three of Illinois’ final stops are qualifying tournaments. Juniors McKenna Schaefbauer and Violeta Martinez are the only Illini not competing this weekend. Martinez is not scheduled to compete at any other events this fall, marking regionals as her final matches of the fall season.
The three Illini who are guaranteed to continue playing after this weekend are senior Megan Heuser, Schaefbauer and sophomore Alice Xu. As the No. 9 doubles pairing in preseason rankings, Heuser and Xu were invited to ITA Conference Masters while Schaefbauer was invited to ITA Sectionals. Both events offer automatic bids to NCAA Individual Championships in late November.
TCU will host a multitude of top teams, including 12 of the top 40 from the most recent ITA team rankings and the reigning national champions, No. 1 Texas A&M. In total, 18 teams will attend the Jae Foundation Invitational. Although the competition is daunting, head coach Evan Clark said that the players welcome the challenge.
“They want to play the best teams and get prepared for the spring,” Clark said. “We want to be playing the best teams, best players, so they feel like they’re prepared headed into the spring. Our spring schedule is pretty much the same way.”
The Illini are coming off a two-week break following their trip to the ITA Midwest Regional. Schaefbauer was a standout at regionals, being the only Illini to advance to the singles quarterfinals. She also picked up a ranked win over No. 50 Sydni Ratliff of Ohio State in the round of 16. Illinois had two doubles teams in the round of 16, Heuser/Xu and senior Kida Ferrari/Martinez.
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“It was a really good break, a really good reset,” Heuser said. “I think the entire team really appreciated it. We have been on the go for the last three, four weeks prior to that. These two weeks were really important for us. We’re able to fine-tune a few things in our game, figure out what wasn’t working before, and try to fix those things. That really was beneficial for not only myself but for the entire team as well.”
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