Fifth-year student-athlete Paulina Jurkowska, junior Sofia Mavor, sophomore Yunfei Cai and freshman Frankie Tye will represent DU at the tournament in singles with Jurkowska/Mavor and Cai/Tye expected to team up in doubles.
The ITA Mountain Regional Championships serves as an qualifier to the 2026 NCAA Division I Women’s Tennis Singles & Doubles Championships, which will be held November 17-22 in Athens, Georgia. The two singles finalists and the winning doubles team during the regional tournament secure automatic berths to the NCAA championship.
Draws are expected to be available by Monday, October 12.
2026 ITA MOUNTAIN REGIONAL TENTATIVE SCHEDULE
Tuesday, October 13 – Beginning at 8 a.m. MT
Singles qualifying
Doubles round of 64
Wednesday, October 14 – Beginning at 8 a.m. MT
Singles round of 64
Doubles rounds of 32 and 16
Thursday, October 15 – Beginning at 8 a.m. MT
Singles rounds of 32 and 16
Doubles quarterfinals
Friday, October 16 – Beginning at 9 a.m. MT
Singles quarterfinals
Doubles semifinals
Saturday, October 17 – Beginning at 9 a.m. MT
Singles semifinals and final
Doubles final
*Schedule subject to change
Doubles matches will be played as 8-game pro sets with a tiebreak at 7-all through the quarterfinals. The doubles semifinals and final will be two standard sets with a 10-point match tiebreak, if needed. Singles matches will be best-of-three full sets.
In the ITA Mountain Regional, Denver is joined by Air Force, Boise State, BYU, Colorado, Colorado State, Idaho, Idaho State, Montana, Montana State, Nevada, New Mexico State, Northern Arizona, UNLV, Utah, Utah State, Utah Tech, Weber State and Wyoming.
This week’s tournament will mark Cai’s second career appearance at the ITA Mountain Regional Championships. As a freshman in 2025, she appeared in the singles qualifying draw and the doubles main draw.
Mavor also made her ITA Mountain Regional Championship debut last year, doing so while playing at Air Force. In 2025, she received automatic placement in the singles main draw and advanced to the round of 16 in doubles.
Jurkowska will make her first appearance at the ITA Mountain Regional Championship, though she twice played at the ITA Northeast Regional Championship while playing at Delaware. Last year, she advanced to the round of 32 in singles while making a run to the doubles semifinals.
This will be Tye’s first ITA Regional Championship, though she made her collegiate debut at the Husker Invitational on September 25-27 and picked up her first NCAA doubles win.
At last year’s ITA Mountain Regional Championship, then-senior Louise Wikander won the singles title to earn a trip to the NCAA singles championship. She became the fourth DU woman to win an ITA regional singles title and the eighth to qualify for the NCAA singles tournament.
Next up for the Pioneers will be their annual home tournament, the Colorado Cup, at Denver Tennis Park on October 23-25.
Denver’s winter/spring dual schedule will be announced later this fall.
