Cowgirls Open Spring with Week of Matches in Sooner State
Courtesy Photo
Wyoming will play six matches over seven days in Oklahoma
LARAMIE, Wyo. (Jan. 9, 2025) – The Wyoming Cowgirl tennis team begins its 2025 slate with a trip to the Sooner State for a week of matches. The six-match swing begins January 11 at Tulsa as a part of the Hurricane Invitational and will conclude Jan. 17 at nationally-ranked Oklahoma, in Norman.
Wyoming, who is entering its 14th campaign under Head Coach Dean Clower, will also play Louisiana Tech (Jan. 11) and Arkansas State (Jan. 12) at the Tulsa Invite. On the 15, the Cowgirls will make the trip to Stillwater to face Oklahoma State. In addition to playing Oklahoma in Norman on the 17th, the Cowgirls will also face Wichita State in another neutral-site match.
The Cowgirls have nearly a brand-new roster in 2025 as just a pair of returnees, Serina Abriola and Violetta Borodina, are back from last season’s 16-11 squad that qualified for the Universal Tennis NIT for the second consecutive season. Borodina is back after being named to the All-Mountain West Doubles Team a season ago. During her first two seasons with the Cowgirls, Borodina has posted a 30-19 singles record and is 41-14 in doubles play. Last season, Borodina and her partner, Sophie Zehender, set the single-season program record for doubles wins with 28. Abriola is in her fourth year with the program and is one of two seniors on the roster.
UW welcomes five newcomers to the 2025 squad. Freshmen Eugenia Ceinos (Buenos Aires, Argentina), Anastasiia Kochelaevskaia (CLS, Russia), Dilnaz Mashabayeva (Almaty, Kazakhstan) and Ruby Young (Christchurch, New Zealand) all began their careers in the Brown & Gold this past fall. Elena Trencheva is also a newcomer and is a senior transfer from Houston and hails from Sofia, Bulgaria.
Wyoming must replace a pair of All-Mountain West performers from last season’s squad in Noesjka Brink and Zehender. Zehender is the most decorated Cowgirl in program history as she finished her career being named a four-time all-league honoree in both doubles and singles. She is the only Cowgirl in program history to “double-up” four-time honors. Wyoming also lost seniors Nikol Dobrilova and Lucia Malinak from last season’s starting lineup.
In the previous 13 seasons under Clower, the Cowgirls have won a program record 170 matches under his tutelage and have won over 60-percent of their contests. Under Clower, Wyoming is 60-24 (.714) in Mountain West play and is an outstanding 64-11 (.853) in home matches. Last season away from Laramie, UW went 3-6 in true road contests and was 4-4 in neutral-site matchups.