CHAPEL HILL, N.C.—The Columbia women's tennis team travels to Chapel Hill, N.C. this Friday through Saturday, Jan. 24-25 to compete in the 12^th annual Intercollegiate Tennis Association Kick-Off weekend event, which will be held at the University of North Carolina's Cone-Kenfield Indoor Tennis Center.
 
Columbia (2-0) opens ITA Kick-Off competition on Friday when it takes on Old Dominion (2-0) at 10 a.m. Host and No. 2 ranked North Carolina (2-0) plays Auburn (2-0) in the second match at 1 p.m. The winners will play in the Championship Match, scheduled for Saturday at 3:30 p.m. The losers of Friday's matches will meet in Saturday's Consolation Match at 6 p.m. The emerging champion will advance to the ITA Indoor Nationals.
 
Columbia is one of 60 NCAA Division I women's teams selected to compete in the ITA Kick-Off event. Selections were made in order of the final 2018-19 Oracle/ITA Tennis Rankings, which Columbia ranked No. 42 nationally.
 
Following a two-year hiatus, it will be the sixth time in Columbia women's tennis history that the Lions have been selected to compete in the ITA Kick-Off event. The other five times were in 2013 (at Georgia), 2014 (at Duke), 2015 (at Georgia Tech), 2016 (at Virginia) and 2017 (at Texas). Columbia dropped consecutive matches to Texas (4-1) and Oregon (4-2) in 2017.
 
The last time Columbia played Old Dominion was in 2012, a 4-0 victory. The Lions have never faced North Carolina or Auburn in women's tennis.
 
Columbia enters this weekend's matches after opening its 2020 dual match season with back-to-back victories over LIU (6-1) and Sacred Heart (7-0). First-year Julia Haynes and junior Jennifer Kerr both led the Lions with two singles victories apiece.
 
Individually, Columbia has put together a 107-42 record in singles and 50-22 doubles record. Leading the Lions are No. 65 ranked singles player Akanksha Bhan (14-4), who advanced to the ITA Nationals Main Draw during the fall, Kerr (10-4), sophomore Melissa Sakar (13-2), Haynes (11-3), first-year Shivani Amineni (11-2), first-year Michelle Xu (15-1) and junior Christie Wan (5-6). In doubles, the Lions are led by Haynes and Xu (11-4), Wan and Sakar (8-2), Kerr and Amineni (5-1), and Bhan and junior Paulina Ferrari (9-5).