{"id":225699,"date":"2026-01-07T17:21:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-07T17:21:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/225699\/"},"modified":"2026-01-07T17:21:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-07T17:21:08","slug":"auburn-womens-tennis-claims-no-4-in-ita-preseason-rankings-auburn-tigers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/225699\/","title":{"rendered":"Auburn women\u2019s tennis claims No. 4 in ITA preseason rankings – Auburn Tigers"},"content":{"rendered":"

AUBURN, Ala. \u2013 Auburn women\u2019s tennis will enter the 2026 dual match season ranked No. 4 in the Intercollegiate Tennis Association preseason rankings, which were released Wednesday. The ranking ties the highest in program history, previously achieved March 7, 2017, and Feb. 20, 2025.<\/p>\n

In addition to its No. 4 ITA ranking, Auburn is ranked first nationally among college women\u2019s teams by Universal Tennis Rating (UTR).<\/p>\n

Auburn moved into the fourth spot after finishing the 2025 campaign ranked No. 8 and making its fifth NCAA Super Regional appearance in program history. The Tigers also tied the program record for most wins in a season with 25, tallied 11 victories over top-25 opponents and earned the highest national seed in program history at No. 9 in the NCAA Tournament.<\/p>\n

The 2025-26 squad features six returners, including DJ Bennett<\/a>, Angella Okutoyi<\/a> and Merna Refaat<\/a>, as well as five newcomers, including transfers Ekaterina Khayrutdinova and Ashton Bowers<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This fall, the roster found success in collegiate tournaments as well as professional events. Junior Ava Esposito<\/a> became the program\u2019s 13th ITA All-American after reaching the round of 16 at the NCAA Singles Championship, while Khayrutdinova, Refaat, Okutoyi and Bennett each claimed International Tennis Federation titles during the fall.<\/p>\n

The No. 4 Tigers will open the season with a home doubleheader against Bellarmine on Sunday at 11 a.m. and 3 p.m. CT at the Yarbrough Tennis Center. Fans in attendance at First Serve on The Plains will receive a women\u2019s tennis schedule magnet while supplies last.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"AUBURN, Ala. \u2013 Auburn women\u2019s tennis will enter the 2026 dual match season ranked No. 4 in the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":225700,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[51663,51666,85,46,263,105,21439,51664,51665],"class_list":["post-225699","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-auburn","tag-auburn-tigers","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-sec","tag-sports","tag-tigers","tag-war-eagle","tag-wareagle"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225699","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=225699"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225699\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/225700"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=225699"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=225699"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=225699"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}