April 29, 2008

INDIANAPOLIS - Eight Big 12 tennis teams were selected to participate in the men's and women's 2008 NCAA Division I Tennis Championships.

Among those selected were squads from eight Big 12 schools. Fresh off winning two Big 12 Championship crowns, both the Baylor men's and women's teams were selected as host institutions by receiving one of the top 16 seeds. The Lady Bears were given the fifth overall seed and will play Oral Roberts in their first round matchup. The BU men will also play ORU in the first round after receiving the No. 9 overall seed. Texas joins the Bears as a host institution in the men's bracket. The seventh-seeded Longhorns shared the regular season Big 12 title with Baylor and finished as runner-up in the postseason conference championships. UT will face in-state neighbors Texas A&M-Corpus Christi in a first-round matchup.

Baylor was not the only Big 12 school to have both the men's and women's squads selected as the Texas women and both Texas A&M teams were selected as one of the top 32 seeds. The 19th-ranked `Horns outlasted No. 25 A&M 4-3 in the Big 12 Championships semifinals by clinching the tiebreak set in a three-hour thriller. TAMU will face Washington in its first round match while the Longhorns head to Tallahassee, Fla. to take on South Florida. The TAMU men head to Waco to square off against SMU in the first round.

Also making the NCAA Championships field were the Oklahoma State and Texas Tech men's teams. The Cowboys and Red Raiders were also awarded one of the top 32 seeds. Tech, currently ranked No. 17 in the nation travels to Ann Arbor, Mich. in a first-round matchup against Harvard. OSU will stay in state to play Denver in the first round at NCAA host Tulsa.

The women's first- and second-round competition will be conducted May 9-11 with the winner of each site advancing to the NCAA Division I Women's Tennis Championships at the Michael D. Case Tennis Center in Tulsa, hosted by the University of Tulsa. The team championship will be held May 15-26.

On the men's side, first- and second-round competition will be conducted Friday-Saturday/Saturday-Sunday, May 9-10/10-11, with the winner of each site advancing to the NCAA Division I Men's Tennis Championships in Tulsa. The team championship will be held May 16-20.

The teams will play a single-elimination tournament at 16 first- and second-round sites (four teams at each site) and the finals site (16-team bracket) to determine the national champion. The matches shall be regulation dual matches with three (3) eight-game, pro-set doubles played for one team point, followed by six (6) singles matches, each valued at one team point, played best of three sets. Regular scoring will be used and a 12-point tiebreaker will be played at eight games all in doubles and at six games all in singles.

Thirty-one conferences received automatic qualification into the 2008 NCAA Division I Tennis Championships.