Radford’s head tennis coach Rob Bareford announced on Monday the addition of Emily Brandow to the program for the upcoming season.
Brandow joins the Highlanders as a freshman coming from Greensboro, N.C. The rising freshman is ranked 14th in her state, 70th in the southern region and 211th in the nation. Brandow has won various top junior level one and two tournaments and just recently was training at the Greensboro Tennis Academy. She boasts a Universal Tennis Rating (UTR) of 8.83 and is a member of the USTA Excellence Team.
Brandow is the second of the Highlanders’ announced additions to this season. The first was Melissa Ifidzhen, who recently joined the team as a transfer from Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) with two years of eligibility left.
At VCU, Ifidzhen accumulated 31 singles victories and 42 doubles victories. She helped guide the team to back-to-back A-10 championships and also picked up an ITA Scholar-Athlete award her freshman year. Prior to her college career, Ifidzhen had a long list of accolades from tournaments she played in including success in the Malta ITF under-18, the Ozerov Cup ITF under-18, and the Fergana Cup ITF under-18.
She started for the Nigerian team in 2015 in the All-African games and was a bronze medalist. She also won the singles and doubles competition in the Championship of Nigeria in both 2015 and 2016.
Brandow and Ifidzhen will contribute immediately to a team looking to build on its shortened season in early 2020 when it compiled a 9-3 record and went 2-2 in conference competition.