WACO, Texas – The 39th-ranked and fifth-seeded Baylor women's tennis team will open the 2016 Big 12 Tennis Championship by facing No. 33 and fourth-seeded Kansas Friday at 9 a.m. at the Greenwood Tennis Center in Stillwater, Okla.
“We need to keep things very simple, focus on preparing and competing at the highest level,” head coach Joey Scrivano said. “We can’t control a lot of things, but we can control how we prepare and then let the chips fall where they may.”
The Bears (17-13, 6-3 Big 12) will take on the Jayhawks (16-6, 6-3 Big 12) as both teams tied for second place in the conference standings along with TCU, Texas and Texas Tech. League tiebreaking procedures decided the seeding for the championship event.
BU is riding a five-match win streak into Friday’s contest, its longest of the year, after beating Texas, 4-2, in Austin to close out its regular season. Baylor has now won 12 of its last 14 matches overall, but is 0-1 in neutral site meetings this season and 4-6 away from Waco.
“It's all about that those nine matches in between the lines on match day, not what happened in our last match or what's happening next,” Scrivano added. “We need to be ready on Friday.”
The Bears are led by the 17th-ranked duo of Kiah Generette and Blair Shankle, who have won nine of their last 10 decisions together. Shankle is also ranked No. 91 in singles.
Kansas went 4-1 over its final five conference matches to tie its highest finish and most wins in Big 12 history. However, KU was swept, 4-0, by Oklahoma State at home in its final match of the season. The Jayhawks have one ranked player in No. 74 Anastasiya Rychagova.
Earlier this year against Kansas, Baylor suffered a 4-3 loss in Lawrence on March 9. BU lost the doubles point and singles matches on courts one, two and six to suffer the setback. It was Baylor’s first loss against Kansas since March 30, 2002. BU had previously been 16-0 under Scrivano vs. the Jayhawks. The Bears now own a 21-5 all-time record over Kansas.
Against the Jayhawks all-time in Big 12 Championship play, Baylor is 4-0 and last beat KU 4-0 in the quarterfinal round of the 2014 event.
In last year’s Big 12 Championship, the top-seed Bears swept Kansas State, TCU and Texas Tech on the way to a second-straight title.
All-time at the Big 12 Championship, Baylor is 34-11 and 29-5 under Scrivano. BU is 15-4 in quarterfinal round matches all-time and 12-1 under Scrivano. BU has been the No. 5 seed at one other conference championship and that was in 1999 as the Bears went 2-1 in that event to reach the semifinals. Baylor has advanced to the semifinal round of the championship for 12 straight years.
The Baylor women enter the weekend in search of their ninth Big 12 Championship title in the last 11 seasons.
