THIS WEEK: WSU women's tennis travels to Manhattan, Kansas to face North Texas, Saturday Feb. 10, at 1 p.m. PT at the Kansas City Raquet Club.  The Cougars will continue play Sunday, Feb. 11 in Manhattan against home-team Kansas State. The Cougars enter the weekend with a 6-0 record, Kansas State with a 3-1 record, and Kansas State with a 2-1 record for the spring season. Last season the Cougars lost to Kansas State 3-4 and defeated North Texas, 4-3.
 
UP NEXT: The Cougars return home to Pullman to face Minnesota Friday, Feb. 23 at 12 p.m. at the Simmelink Tennis Courts at Hollingberry Fieldhouse. They will continue play Saturday, Feb. 24 against Seattle University at 11 a.m. The Cougars are 1-0 all-time against Minnesota and 11-1 against Seattle.
 
LAST WEEK: The Cougars captured their first victory against Purdue, improving their record to 1-2 all-time against the Boilermakers. With this win the Cougars remain undefeated and continue the 2017-18 season 6-0. The match against Purdue opened with the Cougars capturing the opening point with two doubles victories. The first four singles matches were all won by Cougars in straight sets. Freshman Michaela Bayerlova advanced to 11-0 as a collegian and senior Barbora Michalkova improved to 12-0 for the season, her career best win streak.
 
BAYERLOVA RANKED 54 IN ITA NATIONAL SINGLES: Freshmen Michaela Bayerlova is now No. 54 in the ITA National Singles rankings. The ranking followed her victory against No. 86 Silvia Ambrosio, Feb. 3 in the WSU match against Purdue. This was Bayerlova's second time beating a ranked opponent thus far in her collegiate career, her first against then No. 39, now No. 42, Marianna Petrei from the University of Idaho. 
 
BAYERLOVA NAMED PAC-12 WOMEN'S TENNIS PLAYER OF THE WEEK: Michaela Bayerlova was named Pac12's Women's Tennis Player of the Week on Tuesday, Jan. 23. The Pac12 announcement followed her two straight-set victories against Montana State and Iowa. Her win against Idaho's Marianna Petrei, the nation's 39th-ranked player marked the highest-ranked win by a Cougar player since defeating No. 12 Klara Fabikova of California (April 8, 2016). Bayerlova is the sixth player at WSU under Head Coach Lisa Hart to receive player of the week honors. Michaela missed much of the fall season playing in professional tournaments, capturing the $15,000 ITF Charleston event last October defeating the world's 427th-ranked player, Montserrat Gonzalez, in the final. Bayerlova is ranked No. 3 among freshmen/newcomers in the most recent ITA rankings and is currently ranked No. 629 in the world after achieving a career-best of 583 last July.
 
ROSTER BREAKDOWN: For the 2017-18 season the Cougars will have two new players to accompany the five returners. The returning roster consists of senior Barbora Michalkova, junior Aneta Miksovska, and sophomores Melisa Ates and Ege Tomey and Guzal Yusupova. The returning players will be joined by junior Tiffany Mylonas and freshman Michaela Bayerlova.
 
BAYERLOVA CAPTURES TITLE AT ITF CHARLESTON: Freshman Michaela Bayerlova gained her second career title at the ITF Charleston Tournament on Oct. 1. Seeded No. 5, she defeated No. 1 seed Montserrat Gonzalez in the championship match, 2-6, 6-3, 6-3. Gonzalez entered the tournament with a singles world ranking of 438. With Bayerlova's victory, her world ranking now stands at 629.
 
COUGARS IN ITA RANKINGS: Bayerlova was ranked No. 3 among freshmen/newcomers in the Intercollegiate Tennis Association's preseason rankings and junior Tiffany Mylonas was ranked No. 90 in the ITA preseason singles poll. Bayerlova is the first Cougar to receive this title since the ranking began in the fall of 2010. Mylonas is WSU's most recent player to be ranked for preseason singles since junior Elizaveta Luzina in 2014.
 
COACH HART: Lisa Hart is entering her 15th season as the head coach at Washington State. Hart has accumulated 187 wins over her tenure, finishing the last season with a 10-16 record. In 2012, the Cougars went 19-7 as Hart was awarded the Pac-12 Conference Women's Tennis Coach of the Year award.
 
LIVE STATS/VIDEO: For all home matches, fans wishing to follow the Cougars can go to wsu.statbroadcast.com to get live results. Live video of the Purdue match this week can be found at wsucougars.com.
 
THINGS TO KNOW:

• The Cougars advance to 6-0 for the 2018 season, their best start since going 12-0 to start the 2016-17 campaign.
• Freshmen Michaela Bayerlova improves to 11-0 as a collegian, tied for third best winning streaks to start the season since 1983.
• Senior Bara Michalkova is now 12-0 for the 2018 season, continuing her career-best win streak.
• Junior Tiffany Mylonas improved to a 17-2 record for the season, with the most wins of the team thus far.
• The 2018 season has been the first in the history of WSU women's tennis to include wins against two Big Ten teams.