Michigan Hits Road Again, Travels to Ohio State, Penn State

» Michigan is facing both Ohio State and Penn State as Big Ten opponents during the regular season for the first time since April 2015. U-M and Ohio State played the last two seasons as non-conference opponents.
» Michigan has won four straight matches and sits atop the Big Ten standings with Northwestern at 4-0 in conference play.

THIS WEEK
Friday, March 30 -- at Ohio State (Columbus, Ohio), 4 p.m. | Live scoring/video
Sunday, April 1 -- at Penn State (State College, Pa.), 11 a.m. | Live scoring

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The University of Michigan women's tennis team (8-8, 4-0 B1G) is back on the road this weekend for a pair of Big Ten matches. First up for Michigan is Ohio State (8-4, 2-1 B1G) on Friday (March 30) at 4 p.m., followed by a match at Penn State on Sunday (April 1) at 11 a.m. After this weekend, Michigan plays four of its final five matches at the Varsity Tennis Center.

WOLVERINE BITES

• Michigan (8-8, 4-0 B1G) is back to .500 after another 2-0 weekend which featured a 5-2 win at Minnesota (March 25) and a 7-0 shutout win over Purdue on Sunday (March 27). The Wolverines sit atop the Big Ten standings with Northwestern at 4-0.

• U-M is back on the road this weekend as it heads to Ohio State and Penn State. It is the first time since the 2014-15 that the Maize and Blue will face those two teams as conference opponents. The Big Ten schedule features 11 matches, which means each school will play only 11 of 13 possible opponents. This year, U-M does not play Wisconsin or Indiana.

• Junior Brienne Minor has enjoyed the start to Big Ten play, as she is on a four-match winning streak after dropping her first five matches of the season. Minor returned to the Michigan singles lineup during the ITA National Team Indoor Championship after missing the fall season and the first month of dual-match play. Minor joins sophomore Chiara Lommer (four) and junior Kate Fahey (14) as Wolverines who are in the midst of win streaks of at least four matches.

• Michigan mixed up its doubles teams for the first time in nearly a month, and the move paid off as U-M took the doubles point against Purdue (March 25). For the first time since last season, the junior duo of Brienne Minor and Kate Fahey played together. The pair dropped the first two games before rallying for a 6-2 win at the top spot. At No. 3, freshman Alyvia Jones and senior Mira Ruder-Hook played together for the first time and picked up a 6-3 victory to seal the doubles point. Sophomores Chiara Lommer and Lera Patiuk played together for the 12th straight match and were up a break when their match was abandoned.

• Head coach Ronni Bernstein is closing in on career victory No. 400, as she enters this weekend with 396 victories. Bernstein, who is in her 11th season at Michigan, is 231-69 (.770) in Ann Arbor.

• Junior Kate Fahey has continued to shine at the top of Michigan's singles lineup, featuring an 11-0 mark at the No. 1 spot. She has won 14 straight matches to improve her overall singles mark to 20-5. She has not lost since the calendar flipped to 2018. Fahey has 87 career singles wins to tie her for 11th all-time at Michigan. Her .813 winning percentage is tops at U-M as well as the only Wolverine to win at least 80 percent of their singles matches.

• As part of Black History Month, junior Brienne Minor was profiled by The Tennis Channel after winning last year's singles NCAA title. Watch the video here.

• In the latest (March 20) singles rankings, Kate Fahey comes in at No. 22 and Chiara Lommer is at No. 93. The doubles pair of Brienne Minor and Mira Ruder-Hook is in the doubles rankings for the third straight week, earning a No. 53 ranking.

• Ohio State (8-4, 2-1 B1G) is coming off a 6-1 win at Iowa on Sunday (March 25). OSU features a pair of ranked singles players in No. 86 Shiori Fukuda and No. 116 Olivia Sneed, with three doubles teams ranked. Michigan leads the all-time series against the Buckeyes, 42-16, but Ohio State has won the last three matches between the rivals.

• Penn State (6-8, 1-2 B1G) will host Michigan State on Friday (March 30) before the Nitaany Lions welcome the Maize and Blue on Sunday. U-M leads the all-time series against Penn State, 27-3, despite not having faced the Nittany Lions since the 2014-15 season.

• Following this weekend of travel, Michigan will play four straight at the Varsity Tennis Center. First up at home for Michigan will be Illinois on April 7 at noon.

NCAA RULES
Each team match will be a contest for the best of seven team points. Doubles action will begin immediately with no warmup, so fans are encouraged to arrive on time for matches. In addition, each doubles match will be one set to six, with a tiebreaker occurring at 6-all. The team that wins two-of-three matches will secure the doubles point. Following a five-minute intermission, singles action will begin with each match worth one point towards the team score. There will be no-ad scoring in both singles and doubles action. In addition, there is to be no noise made between first and second serves this season as part of new ITA sportsmanship guidelines.