Rutgers University
ITA Regionals
Tennis Prepares for ITA Regionals
Sep 29 | Women's Tennis
Rutgers will travel to Princeton for ITA Regionals from Sept. 30-Oct. 2
PRINCETON, N.J. – The Rutgers women's tennis team will compete in ITA Regionals from Sept. 30-Oct. 2. The three-day tournament will be hosted by Princeton University at the Lenz Tennis Center and Jadwin Gymnasium.
Tournament Format
Four rounds of singles play in addition to three rounds of doubles will take place over the weekend.
Friday, Sept. 30
- Round of 128 singles
- Round of 64, doubles
- Round of 32, doubles
Saturday, Oct. 1
- Round of 64, singles
- Round of 32, singles
- Round of 16, doubles
Sunday, Oct. 2
- Round of 16, singles
- Quarterfinals, doubles
The winners of Round of 16 singles and QF doubles matches will advance to the ITA Super-Regional which is scheduled for October 21-24 in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Last Time Out
From Sept. 23-25, the Scarlet Knights opened their season at the Bulldog Invitational hosted by Yale. Over the three-day tournament, the team faced Yale, Brown and Boston University in both doubles and singles competition.
Jackelin Lopez had a very strong start to her sophomore season as she did not drop a set all weekend to improve to 3-0 in singles. Chloe Brown and Amira Badawi each also came out of the tournament with two singles wins each.
The duo of Brown/Daira Cardenas also had a strong showing going 3-0 in doubles play. The newcomer pair of Mai Nguyen/Tara Chilton also picked up two victories in doubles.
Transferring In
RU welcomed two transfers this offseason in Amira Badawi (NJIT) and Tara Chilton (Washington).
Badawi, a native of Cairo, Egypt, compiled a 30-7 record with NJIT over two seasons, including an impressive 22-5 mark playing in the top three singles spots for the Highlanders in 2021-22, a season that ended with a second place showing in the Southland Conference Tournament.
In her two seasons at Washington, Chilton compiled an 18-18 singles and 17-14 doubles record. Last year as a sophomore, Chilton and the No. 37 Huskies played to a 14-12 overall record and an appearance in the NCAA Tournament. She went 7-2 in singles tournament play including reaching the round of 32 at ITA Northwest Regional.
Freshmen Duo
Rutgers also welcomed two freshmen to the squad, Mai Nguyen and Arina Volitova.
Ranked top 75 nationally, Nguyen arrives "On The Banks" from Atlanta, Georgia. She was the 2019 Southern Doubles Champions and finished in fifth in National Doubles. She was also the 2020 Georgia State Champion and 2021 Winter Southerns Champions.
A product of Bratislava, Slovakia, Valitova comes to the US after finding success in the European Junior circuit. She won the ITF Juniors tournaments and Tennis Europe tournaments in both singles and doubles. Valitova also won the singles J5 in Islamabad in Nov. 2020 in addition to the singles J5 in Harare in Dec. 2020. In doubles, she came out on top in the J3 in Harare in Nov. 2021 and J4 in Estonia in May 2021. She is also a member of Russian National Beach Tennis Team (U18) and won the Juniors European Championship in doubles.
Looking Ahead
RU will return to Princeton from Oct. 14-16 for the Princeton Invitational. The team will continue onto two more tournaments in the ITA Super Regional (Oct. 21-23) and the Big Green Invitational (Nov. 4-6).
Players Mentioned
