TWU, Union Earn Bids to NAIA National Championship

KANSAS CITY, Mo. – [Bracket] The National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) has officially announced the 24-team field for the 42nd Annual NAIA Women's Tennis National Championship. The event will be held at the Mobile Tennis Center in Mobile, Ala., from May 16-20, for the 19th-consecutive year (the 2020 event was canceled due to COVID-19).

The field consists of 15 automatic berths, including one host berth, and nine at-large selections. Automatic qualification is mainly given to conference and unaffiliated grouping tournament champions. For the sixth consecutive year, at-large teams were determined by the NAIA Tennis National Selection Committee (NSC). The NSC consists of coaches and administrators from around the country. The committee evaluated teams throughout the year on various criteria. Mobile (Ala.) received the host berth.

The Appalachian Athletic Conference (AAC) is sending two teams in Tennessee Wesleyan and Union. Tennessee is the No. 13 seed and received an at-large bid, while Union is the No. 14 seed and earned an automatic berth after winning the AAC Tournament.

Keiser (Fla.) enters the 2023 championship as the top seed. The Seahawks were ranked at the top of the last six-consecutive NAIA Top 25 polls after handing the defending national champion Georgia Gwinnett its lone loss of the season.

No. 2-seeded Georgia Gwinnett is in pursuit of its seventh-consecutive national title in 2023 (eighth overall). The Grizzlies are 31-1 all-time in the national tournament and lead all active NAIA programs in national championship titles with seven. The Grizzlies are one of three programs in the 2023 field which have just one loss on the season. Top seeded Keiser (Fla.) along with Union all-enter with a single blemish on their records.

The Wildcats of Indiana Wesleyan have the most tournament appearances of the field with 23. Lindsey Wilson (Ky.) (18), SCAD Savannah (Ga.) (18), Keiser (Fla.) (17), Mobile (Ala.) (17), Xavier (La.) (15) and William Carey (Miss.) (11) are the only other schools that have 10 or more appearances.

The Sun Conference leads all conferences and unaffiliated groupings with the most schools in the field with five. The Southern States Athletic Conference has the next highest total with four.

Eighteen of the 24 teams in the field are returning from 2022. Loyola (La.) is breaking the longest drought of the teams that have qualified previously. The Wolfpack last made an appearance at the final site in 2019.

Five teams will be making their first appearance in the NAIA Women's Tennis National Championship. Cornerstone (Mich.), Holy Cross (Ind.), Oakland City (Ind.), Ottawa (Kan.) and Westcliff (Calif.) will all be newcomers to the NAIA Women's Tennis National Championship.

For more information on the 2023 NAIA Women's Tennis National Championship, click here.