Cougars Receive Spot in NCAA Championships

PROVO -- The NCAA announced Wednesday the first round pairings for the 2006 NCAA Women's Tennis Championships. The No. 28 BYU Cougars, who finished the season with a 20-7 overall record and second place finish in the Mountain West Conference, will face the Arizona Wildcats in Taube Stadium on the Campus of Stanford University.

"We're really excited to play Arizona, and to be playing them at Stanford," BYU coach Craig Manning said. "This will be a great experience for us."

Arizona enters the tournament coming off a 12-11 season in the Pac-10 Conference. Although the Cougars and Wildcats never met during the season, they did share a few common opponents. Both squads faced Denver, Oklahoma, Oregon, Washington, and Washington State during the regular season. Both BYU and Arizona were victorious in those matches.

The first round match will be played on May 12. Start time for the match TBD. A win in the first round would put the Cougars in a second round match up with the winner of No. 1 Stanford (24-0) and Quinnipiac (11-10).

Now that the team knows where it is headed, the Cougars wait to see if their lone senior, No. 24 Olga Boulytcheva, makes it into the NCAA Singles Championships.

Complete brackets can be found at: www.ncaasports.com