Big Ten season comes with big-time matches, and any match between IU and Purdue is important.
The IU women’s tennis team will be in West Lafayette, Indiana, for this year’s match and has a 10-8 overall record but is just 1-3 in the conference.
Purdue has yet to win a Big Ten match this season in four tries and is just 5-10 overall.
While the records indicate IU as the favorite, the Hoosiers have only been able to beat the Boilermakers once since 2012.
Now, with IU and Purdue in 11th and 13th, respectively, they both sit outside of making the Big Ten Tournament. The top 10 teams make the tournament, so this match carries extra weight.
“Playing Purdue is always going to be big,” senior Paula Gutierrez said. “But at this point in the season when we are playing to get into the Big Ten Tournament this match is even bigger for us.”
IU is coming off two losses last weekend to Michigan, 4-0, and Michigan State, 5-2. These are the same two teams Purdue lost to last weekend as well, with the Boilermakers losing 5-2 to both.
IU has not won the doubles point in its last four matches, and IU Coach Ramiro Azcui said he thinks that it will be the key to winning this match.
Gutierrez said she believes if the team would have gotten the doubles point against Michigan State IU might have won that match.
“We are going to have to do a lot of things well and the most important thing is that we have to focus on ourselves,” Azcui said. “There’s going to be a lot of outside factors like playing on their courts and in front of their fans, so we have to control what we can control.”
Azcui said Purdue has been switching up its doubles teams a lot so IU won’t know what to expect, so the Hoosiers need to focus on themselves.
IU is no stranger to being able to clinch the first point of the match. At the beginning of the season, the Hoosiers got the doubles point six times in their first seven matches. Also, the No.1 doubles team of senior Kim Schmider and sophomore Madison Appel are ranked No. 41 in the nation.
“We just haven’t been coming out as strong,” Azcui said. “In this match, we just need to go for it. Lately, we’ve been tentative and weren’t being aggressive enough.”
The Hoosiers won’t be done for the weekend after taking on the Boilermakers. IU will turn around and head back home to face an 8-5 Marquette team, which IU is familiar with from previous invitationals.
“We know all the players really well,” Gutierrez said. “They are a tough team to beat, but I think we can beat them.”
Azcui said he thinks if they can beat Marquette it will help with the team's confidence in their remaining schedule against Big Ten teams. The main focus, however, is on rival Purdue.
The match against Purdue will be 10 a.m. Saturday in West Lafayette. IU will be back home against Marquette for a 10 a.m. start Sunday.
