The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga women's tennis team hits the road for the start of the 2012 fall season this weekend. The Lady Mocs travel to Auburn, Ala., for the Auburn Fall Invitational on Sept. 7-8.
The Mocs will be joined by nine other teams, including host Auburn, along with Mississippi State, Tulane, Northwestern State, Lamar, Houston, Georgia Southern, Kennesaw State and Louisiana-Lafayette. Draws will be announced on Friday morning with action following immediately after.
"The team has been working hard the past several weeks," stated UTC head coach Jeff Clark. "It's time to play a tournament now. We look forward to the tough competition this weekend down at Auburn."
All nine members of the team will make the trip this weekend. UTC returns four letter winners while adding five newcomers. Senior Jenna Nurik (Roswell, Ga.) is a three-time All-Southern Conference selection and had a 24-12 record last season. Sophomore Kaylene Chadwell (Franklin, Tenn.) is also back after earning SoCon Freshman of the Year honors with a 23-10 singles record last season.
Junior Alexa Flynn (Memphis, Tenn.) is a two-year starter who was 19-10 in 2011-12. Sophomore Claire Mulyadi (Semarang, Indonesia) joined the team in January and went 9-8 in singles in the spring.
The Lady Mocs newcomers are listed as the No. 9 mid-major recruiting class in the country by TennisRecruiting.net. This group includes four-star signees Kelsey Coots (Huntsville, Ala.), Katie Polk (Woodstock, Ga.) and Kayla Jones (Memphis, Tenn.), as well as three-star prospect Alison Storie (Johnson City, Tenn.), and Oklahoma State transfer Jovana Pecovski (Apatin, Serbia).
Clark is in the sixth year of his second stint as head coach of the Lady Mocs. UTC went 16-6 last season, the most wins for the program since 1999.