Martins Earns At-Large Bid for National Indoor Collegiate Championships

Oct. 27, 2016

COLUMBIA, S.C. – The Intercollegiate Tennis Association announced its selections for the 2016 USTA/ITA National Indoor Collegiate Championships on Thursday, and South Carolina’s Ingrid Gamarra Martins was extended an at-large invitation. Martins is set to become the first Gamecock to compete at the event since 1990.

“Ingrid has had a very strong fall at both the collegiate and ITF levels, and we were proud that the ITA selected her as an at-large competitor,” said head coach Kevin Epley. “It has been a long time since South Carolina has been represented at the National Indoors and we believe she has a great chance to do well there.”

Martins’ selection comes on the heels of an outstanding fall campaign. The Rio de Janeiro, Brazil native has garnered a 10-3 singles record over the course of three tournaments this fall. She has posted five ranked wins, while two of her three defeats came to higher-ranked opponents. Perhaps her most notable achievement came at the ITA All-American Championships, where she made it through qualifying and into the main draw, making it as far as the round of 16 before falling to Florida’s ninth-ranked Belinda Woolcock. Just by reaching the main draw, Martins was able to do something no other Gamecock had done since 2000. The last time Carolina had a representative in the round of 16 was in 1999, when Katarina Markovski reached the final 16 before dropping her match to Wake Forest’s Adria Engel. One would have to look back further to find the last time a Gamecock competed at indoors. Carolina’s last participant at the event was Nathalie Rodriguez in 1990. She fell in the round of 32 to Minnesota’s Jennie Moe.

The 2016 USTA/ITA National Indoor Collegiate Championships will run from Nov. 3-6 at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Flushing N.Y.