Beach Tennis Returns Home to Host Fall Tournament

LONG BEACH, Calif. - Long Beach Tennis returns home for the first time in 577 days to host the LBSU Fall Invitational at the Rhodes Tennis Center, with action running Friday, Oct. 8 through Sunday, Oct. 10. Long Beach State will compete against CSUN, Cal State Fullerton, Colorado State, Grand Canyon, and UC Irvine.

The format will feature three singles flights and three doubles flights.

The Beach will have seven players competing this weekend. In singles play, Zara Lennon, Nikola Homolkova and Claire Le Du will compete in flight A. In flight B, LBSU will have two players in action, Arina Babkova and Zuzanna Szczepanska. Finally, the Beach will have Sheena Masuda and Andreea Ciornei competing in Flight C.

In doubles action, the Beach will switch it up compared to last week. LBSU will have two teams competing in flight A with Lennon and Le Du teaming up, as well as Homolkova and Masuda paired together. Meanwhile, Babkova and Szczepanska will pair up in flight B.

Play begins at 10 a.m. on Friday, Oct. 8 with doubles action up first followed by singles play.

Last Time Out:
Newcomers on the Block:
Long Beach State had six newcomers compete for the first time at the collegiate level last weekend at the San Diego State Fall Classic. Arina Babkova, Andreea Ciornei, Nikola Homolkova, Claire Le Du, Sheena Masuda, and Zuzanna Szczepanska all made their debuts.

Breaking out the Brooms:
Long Beach athletes had eight-straight set sweeps in singles play at the San Diego State Fall Classic. Claire Le Du and Nikola Homolkova each had two matches where they won in straight sets, while Arina Babkova, Andreea Ciornei, Zara Lennon, and Sheena Masuda.

Title Town:
Claire Le Du started her collegiate career off strong by going a perfect 3-0 in singles play at the San Diego State Fall Classic. The Normandy, France native won her quarterfinal match in straight sets on Friday, battled through a three-match thriller on Saturday, and then won the gold flight in straight sets over Laura Marco Mas of San Jose State Sunday, 6-4, 6-2.

Coaches File:
Head Coach Jenny Hilt-Costello enters her 24th year at the helm of the Long Beach State Women's Tennis Program. In 24 seasons as head coach at Long Beach State she has taken the women's tennis program into the national elite during a run that included 22 Big West regular season or tournament titles in 18 seasons, 13 NCAA tournament berths, 17 consecutive nationally-ranked seasons and achieving Beach Tennis' first Top 20 ranking. The results have all come versus a nationally ranked schedule, which includes multiple wins annually over opponents from the ACC, Big 10, Big 12 and Pac-12.

Calendar

Players Mentioned

Arina Babkova

Nikola Homolkova

Claire Le Du

Zara Lennon

Sheena Masuda

Zuzanna Szczepanska

Long Beach State University Athletics