Sept. 20, 2005

Santa Clara, Calif. - This weekend, the Santa Clara women's tennis team will travel to Fresno, Calif. to compete for the first time in the 2005-06 season at the Bulldog Classic. The all-day individual and doubles tournament will begin on Friday, September 23 and end on Sunday, September 25. Junior Kelly Leathers will be seeded 12th in the tournament, while freshman Samantha Georgino is seeded 14th. Other Bronco players expected to compete in singles include juniors Erika Barnes and Kim Daniel, sophomore Myra Davoudi, and freshmen Stephanie Galainena, Stephanie Herrmann and Flavia Mircale. The doubles participants include Leathers and Davoudi, Barnes and Georgino, Daniel and Davoudi, and Miracle and Herrmann.

Although the team season is just a few months off, Coupe will use early season tournaments like the Bulldog Classic to test his players and see where they will fall in his line-up come January. While victories are important to the second-year head coach, he will also be looking at other aspects of his team to emerge by the conclusion of the weekend.

"For me, it's really about their competitiveness," said head coach Damon Coupe about what he hopes to see this weekend. "Are they going out there and finding ways to win? Are they constructing points? I'm excited about this weekend. It's always a good tournament to go to and we have the opportunity to play against some really good schools and some ranked players. It's chance for our girls to immediately gauge where they are at with some of the West Coast schools."