MSU Lady Netters Grab Two NCAA Individual Bids
The 2005 SEC Freshman of the Year, the 19th-ranked Fodor earned a South Region at-large singles bid in the field of 64 following an outstanding individual season in which she posted a 35-8 overall record, 8-3 within the SEC en route to a first-team, all-SEC selection. Playing at the No. 1 position every match of the season, the former Budapest, Hungary, product opened the fall campaign winning 15 of her first 16matches, including two tournament titles and one consolation title. She finished the fall season with an 18-3 overall mark.
During the spring season, Fodor won eight of her first nine matches, storming out of the gate with an 8-1 overall record and finishing the spring with a 15-4 mark, 8-3 in the SEC. In just her first year on campus, Fodor recorded an unblemished 10-0 home record which included upset wins over the fifth and seventh-ranked singles players. During an April 3rd match at LSU, Fodor picked up her 32nd singles win of the season, etching her name in the MSU record books as she passed State's Andrea Lord's 31 for tops on the schools all-time singles wins in a season list. At the conclusion of the SEC Tournament, Fodor was listed as the 15th-ranked singles player in the nation, having never dropped below No. 28 in the 14 consecutive weeks she was ranked.
Joining Fodor in Athens will be Kugakolova, as the duo will compete among 32 doubles teams in the NCAAs. Currently the 14th-ranked doubles team in the nation, Fodor and Kugakolova finished their season with a 23-6 overall record, 8-3 in the always difficult SEC. In the fall season, the two finished with a 6-2 overall record which included an upset win over in-state rival and 15th-ranked Mississippi.
Spring competition would produce many of the same results as the highly touted tandem were undefeated at the A.J. Pitts Tennis Centre, finishing the 2005 spring campaign with a perfect 9-0 record. Along the way, the duo knocked off the seventh-ranked doubles team in the nation and upset Kentucky's sixth-ranked team in the quarterfinal round of the SEC Tournament. The two were ranked every week of the season for 14 consecutive weeks, reaching as high as No. 13 and never falling below No. 46 For their outstanding efforts during the course of the season, the two earned second-team, all-SEC accolades in doubles at the conclusion of the regular season.
The singles and doubles competition will be conducted May 23-28 at the Dan Magill Tennis Complex in Athens, Ga., following the conclusion of the team championship (May 19-22). The University of Georgia will serve as the tournament host.