Bracket

WICHITA, Kan. – Wichita State will travel to Oxford, Miss. next weekend to compete in First and Second Round action in the 2018 NCAA Women's Tennis Team Championship.
 
The Shockers (18-7) are making their 10^th consecutive appearance in the field of 64 and their 12^th overall. They'll will meet Syracuse on Friday, May 11 with the winner advancing to Saturday's Second Round to face either top-seed Mississippi or Missouri State. Match times will be announced later.
 
Survivors from each of the 16 four-team pods move on to the final site, May 17-22 in Winston-Salem, N.C., to compete for the NCAA's national team championship.
 
"We've had a really good year," WSU head coach Colin Foster said. "We've challenged ourself with a lot of top-50 matches. We've come out on top in some of them, and in others come up just short, but we've been very consistent all year."
 
The Shockers are 24-8 all-time against former Missouri Valley Conference rival Missouri State but have never faced Syracuse or Ole Miss.
 
Syracuse (17-7, 8-6 ACC) is ranked No. 27 in the latest Oracle/ITA Division I Rankings. The Orange are in the field for the second time in three years. After finishing seventh out of 15 teams in the ACC regular season race, they advanced to the quarterfinals of the conference tournament. Gabriela Knutson entered the week at No. 4 on the Division I singles chart, and she and teammate Miranda Ramirez are also ranked 10^th nationally in doubles.
 
"Syracuse is strong," Foster said. "They upset Georgia Tech, which is a top-5 team. The ACC is probably a top-2 conference, along with the SEC, so they'll be battle tested."
 
Ole Miss (20-6), from the aforementioned SEC, is the No. 5 overall seed and will be making its 10^th-consecutive appearance. SEC Player of the Year Arianne Hartano is the ranked fifth nationally in singles and is part of a double team that ranks seventh.
 
Missouri State (12-9) resurrected its program in 2015 after a nine-year absence. The Bears' MVC Tournament title was the program's first since 2002.
 
WSU, which had won each of the last nine MVC crowns, fell in the semifinals of its first American Athletic Conference Tournament.  Helped by a schedule that included 12 matches against teams that began the week in the nation's top-50, the Shockers earned the program's first-ever at-large bid.
 
"We challenged ourselves with a tough schedule and certainly felt that we'd done enough to deserve a berth," Foster said. "We're glad the committee agreed."
 
WSU's Fatima Bizhukova entered the week ranked No. 67 nationally in singles. She's 4-4 against ranked foes this year, including an upset of No. 3 Andrea Lazaro of FIU last fall that is believed to be the highest-rated victory in school history.
 
Seniors Giulia Guidetti (95 career singles wins) and Gabriela Porubin (92) both rank in the program's all-time top-10. Porubin is also third on the school's career doubles list (101).
 
WSU is one of three American Athletic Conference teams in the field, joined by UCF and Tulsa.