Six PBC Women's Tennis Players Named All-Americans

NEW YORK, NY – Six Peach Belt Conference women’s tennis players were named to the Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) All-America team.  To be named an All-American, a player must be ranked among the top 20 singles players or on the top 10 doubles teams in the nation in the final ITA rankings for the 2009-10 season.

Armstrong Atlantic State is the only Division II school in the nation with four players named to the All-America team.  Sona Novakova and Alida Muller-Wehlau qualified for both their singles and doubles play while the doubles team of Martina Beckmann and Gabriela Kovacs were also honored.  Francis Marion’s Tereza Sykorova was also honored for both singles and doubles play and was joined by doubles partner Sabina Baberadova.

Three-time NCAA Division II national champion Armstrong Atlantic State is the No. 1-ranked team for a third straight season with a perfect 33-0 record after the Lady Pirates downed BYU-Hawaii, 5-1, on May 15 in the national championship match.

All six singles players for the Lady Pirates have earned final national singles rankings, led by ITA Super Bowl singles champion and two-time PBC Player of the Year Sona Novakova, who is ranked No. 2 in the final DII rankings. Junior Alida Muller-Wehlau is ranked a career-best No. 3 in the singles rankings, earning both players All-American honors. 

A pair of doubles teams for the Lady Pirates earned top 10 rankings, led by the top-ranked doubles duo in the nation, Beckmann and Muller-Wehlau. The German duo defeated the previously undefeated and No. 2-ranked duo of Elwen Li and Yuan Jia of BYU-Hawaii, 8-5, in the May 15 national championship match, earning them the No. 1 ranking. Kovacs and Novakova check in at No. 8 in the doubles rankings, and both doubles teams will earn ITA All-American honors.

For Francis Marion, Sykorova, a native of Prague, Czech Republic, was 16-4 while occupying her team’s No. 1 singles position for most of the year.  She finished 2010 ranked 10th in Division II.

Baberadova, a native of Brno, Czech Republic, teamed with Sykorova to post a 20-3 doubles record at the No. 1 position, including a 10-2 mark in PBC play. They ended the season ranked fourth nationally, with two of their three losses coming at the hands of the No. 1 ranked doubles duo.

The Patriots women (17-6) also advanced to the finals of the NCAA Southeast Regional Tournament and were ranked 13th in the final ITA national poll.

Baberadova is the ninth All-American in the history of the Patriot women’s program, joining Siobhan Murnane (1992), Mary Hirst (1992, 1993, 1994), Lee Whitwell (1993, 1994, 1996), Orsolya Somorjai (1998, 1999), Annamaria Atamaniuk (1998, 1999, 2000, 2001), Kristyna Horakova (2009), Jitka Gavdunova (2009), and Sykorova (2008, 2009, 2010).