November 4, 1998

Singles Draw (Lower)
Singles Draw (Upper)
Doubles Draw

NOTRE DAME, Ind. – The Notre Dame womens tennis team will play host to the ITA Midwest Region Singles and Doubles Championship beginning Thurs., Nov. 5, and concluding with the finals on Sun., Nov. 8, with play beginning at 9:00 a.m. each morning at the Eck Tennis Pavilion and the Lakewood Racket Club in Niles, Mich. The tournament concludes the fall season and crowns singles and doubles champions in the Midwest region. All NCAA Division I schools in the Midwest are eligible to send participants.

The singles championship will consist of a 64-player draw, and the doubles championship will be a 32-team draw. Notre Dame sophomore and defending champion Michelle Dasso is the top seed in the single competition and will play Wisconsins April Gabler in the first round. Marquettes Ana Fernandez and Elisa Penalvo are top seeds in doubles and will play Michigans Boylan and Vaughn in the first round. Northwesterns Katherine Nasser and Laura Guignon won the doubles title a year ago. Nasser will defend her crown with Colleen Cheng in 1998.

The first two rounds of singles and the first round of doubles will be played on Thursday. The third round and the quarterfinals of singles and the second round of doubles will be on Friday. The semifinals of singles and the quarterfinals and semifinals of doubles will be played on Saturday. Singles and doubles finals will be held on Sunday.

Notre Dame leads the singles field with nine entrants in the 64-player draw. In addition to Dasso, Irish senior All-American Jennifer Hall is seeded fourth, and senior Marisa Velasco is an alphabetical 9-16 seed. Juniors Kelly Zalinski and Sarah Scaringe, sophomore Kimberly Guy and freshmen Lindsey Green, Becky Varnum and Nina Vaughan also will compete in the singles competition. Marquette is second with five players in singles.

Among the other singles seeds include second-seeded Penalvo and third-seeded Barbara Urbanska from Wisconsin. Eleven of the 64 singles players are ranked by Intercollegiate Tennis Association, including three in the top 30. Dasso is ranked 17th, Hall is 23rd and Penalvo is 26th.

In doubles, Notre Dame leads with three teams in the field. Dasso and Hall are seeded third behind Fernandez and Penalvo and Ohio States second-seeded Kristy Dascoli and Brianna Harris. The Irish teams of Green and Scaringe and Vaughan and Zalinski also qualified for the draw. Eight of the 32 duos are ranked by the ITA among the top 30 teams in the country, led by the 13th-ranked team of Dascoli and Harris and 18th-ranked Dasso and Hall.

Eight players in the singles and doubles field also competed at Notre Dame during the 1998 NCAA singles and doubles championship. Dascoli, Dasso, Hall, Nasser and Penalvo were singles participants. Purdues Jennifer Embry, Michigans Danielle Lund, Fernandez, Dascoli, Hall and Penalvo all competed in the doubles.