WMU Home > About WMU > WMU News

WMU News

Women's tennis wins 10th MAC championship

May 7, 2007

KALAMAZOO--For the second year in a row, Western Michigan University's nationally ranked women's tennis team has completed an undefeated run through the Mid-American Conference, taking the championship title in both regular season and MAC Tournament play. The team's next stop will be the NCAA Division I Women's Tennis Championship Tournament.

Under the direction of head coach and 2007 MAC Coach of the Year Betsy Kuhle, the Broncos have gone undefeated for three years, winning 26 straight regular-season conference matches and claiming three successive MAC titles--10 overall. This year's is the team's fourth, and second consecutive, MAC Tournament championship.

WMU's women's tennis team was MAC champion in 1984, 1990, 1995, 1997, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2005, 2006 and 2007. The team also won the MAC Tournament championship and advanced to the NCAA Tournament in 1999, 2000, 2006 and 2007.

"I don't think anybody can understand the magnitude of this accomplishment," Kuhle says. "It's not that we've won every match the last three years, but that we haven't lost in three years. Every player on this team refuses to lose."

The accomplishments of the women's tennis team are especially remarkable this season considering the loss of three of last year's top-four players, and the addition of two first-year players to the regular lineup. Despite challenges, the team came back full force to hush critics and extend the Bronco's winning stretch, picking up three all-conference awards along the way. Senior Carrie S. Jeanmaire, of Rockford, Ill., and sophomore Kerstin Beeke Pahl, of Laboe, Germany, both were named First Team All-MAC. Junior Priyanka Parekh, of Kolkata, India, was named Second-Team All-MAC.

The WMU women's tennis team will make its fourth NCAA Tournament appearance Friday, May 11, when the Broncos travel to Evanston, Ill., to battle the Northwestern University Wildcats.

For more information, visit www.wmubroncos.com.

Related story
Kuhle earns sixth MAC Coach of the Year award

Media contact: Tonya Hernandez, (269) 387-8400, tonya.hernandez@wmich.edu

WMU News
Office of University Relations
Western Michigan University
1903 W Michigan Ave
Kalamazoo MI 49008-5433 USA
(269) 387-8400
www.wmich.edu/wmu/news