The Valparaiso University men’s tennis team has released its schedule for the 2019-2020 season, a competitive slate that features five matches against teams that played in the NCAA Tournament last season.

Valpo will open the season in September with two road tournaments. The squad will travel to the River Forest Invitational in Chicago for a season-opening event that runs Sept. 13-15. Then, the team will make its way to Ohio for the Toledo Invitational the weekend of Sept. 20-22.

Senior Brandon Ancona (Belvidere, Ill. / Rockford Christian) has qualified for the Oracle ITA Masters, which will run Sept. 26-29 in Malibu, Calif.

Valpo will have its annual Homecoming weekend exhibition event as the Alumni Tournament is slated for 3 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 28.

The October slate begins when the team travels to the Purdue Fall Invitational for the second straight season on Oct. 4-6. The ITA All-American Championships in Tulsa run Oct. 5-7, while the ITA Midwest Regional hosted at Ohio State is slated to occur from Oct. 17-21.

Valpo will kick off the spring season by facing instate rival Butler on Jan. 25 in Indianapolis. The next day, the team will host its first home match of the season against Western Michigan at The Courts of NWI, which has returned as the team’s indoor home venue this season. Rounding out the month of January, Valpo will travel to Chicago State on Jan. 31.

The month of February features home matches against Northern Illinois (Feb. 1), Cleveland State (Feb. 15) and Ball State (Feb. 21) in addition to challenging road dates at Marquette (Feb. 9) and Purdue (Feb. 22).

During the month of March, the team will head to Texas for its spring trip, which starts with a battle with SMU on March 1 in Houston. March 4 is a date veteran head coach Jim Daugherty will have circled on his calendar as Valpo visits Baylor. Bears assistant coach Michael Woodson is a two-time Valpo graduate and played under Daugherty before spending four seasons on staff as an assistant coach and associate head coach.

The team will then play in two neutral-site matches on March 7 at Baylor, facing Prairie View A&M and Abilene Christian. Valpo will battle Texas A&M on Sunday, March 8 to round out the trip to Texas. The team will end the month of March with the Summit League opener at North Dakota.

April features three home matches against league foes Illinois State (April 3), Denver (April 5) and Oral Roberts (April 11). The team will have two more Summit League road contests against Omaha (April 17) and Drake (April 18) to round out the regular season. Valpo will travel to Denver to compete in the Summit League Tournament on April 24-25.  

Daugherty will have plenty of experience, talent and leadership heading into the 2019-2020 season with five seniors to go along with three freshmen. The group will be tested by five 2019 NCAA Tournament teams – Big 12 champion Baylor, Horizon League champion Cleveland State, NCAA at-large selection Texas A&M, Summit League champion Drake and MAC champion Western Michigan. In addition, Butler went 21-7 and 4-1 in the Big East, Marquette went 15-9 and reached the Big East final, Northern Illinois finished above .500 and reached the MAC final, Abilene Christian went 22-5 and Purdue is a Big Ten opponent.