Fereres, Frierson qualify for 2025 ITA Cup in doubles

ROME, Ga. – The 2025 Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) Cup will be held at the Rome Tennis Center this week, and Loyola University New Orleans will be represented by two women's tennis graduate students, Adele Fereres and Avery Frierson, who will be competing in the NAIA doubles tournament. 

This will be both Loyola student-athletes' first appearance at the ITA Cup, which serves as the individual championship tournament for NCAA Division II, Division III, NAIA, and Junior College levels and dates back to 1986. They join Lucy Carpenter, Fatima Vasquez, Micaela Ponce, and Ariana Salgueiro-Estela as Wolf Pack women's tennis players who have qualified for the ITA Cup. 

At the end of September, the duo beat two top-4 seeds, including the top overall team from William Carey, and won four matches overall at the ITA Gulf Regional Championship. Their only loss came in the final, a three-setter against two-time defending champion McKenna Wheatley and newcomer Maja Brnic of Xavier. 

The first matchup for Fereres and Frierson is on Thursday against Yasmin Imamniyazova and Ana Lopez Torres from Marian (Ind.), a team that Loyola eliminated in last season's NAIA National Championship. Imamniyazova is the No. 39-ranked singles player in the NAIA, while Lopez was a part of last year's No. 36-ranked doubles team. 

With an opening-round win, Loyola's pair could potentially see a Friday rematch against Xavier's Wheatley and Brnic, who are seeded No. 4 in the tournament. 

Fereres is coming off of a record 17-3 singles season last year where she was named First-Team All-Conference for the first time, as well as the SSAC Championship MVP. She also went 18-3 in doubles, and she and Ponce were ranked as high as No. 44 in NAIA doubles. Frierson had 10 singles wins last season and 10 more in doubles, mostly playing with Reilly Briggs, with both Briggs and Frierson being named Second-Team All-SSAC. 

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