As colder weather starts rolling into Iowa, the Hawkeye women’s tennis team will be migrating south.

The Hawkeyes are heading to Miami, Florida, this weekend for the Florida International University Invitational. The tournament is the final event of the fall session for Iowa.

“FIU, USF, and Mizzou will be great competitive tests for us,” head coach Sasha Schmid said. “The next time we compete in January will be as a team in season, so we want to finish strong and learn a lot and build as much momentum as possible.”

The matchup against Missouri is particularly salient for Iowa this weekend. Before coming to Iowa City to coach the Hawkeyes, Schmid coached the Tigers from 2012 to 2016. During her time at Missouri, Schmid posted a 43-63 record. The Tigers were 16-12 in Schmid’s final year with the team.

The matchup against FIU may also be critical for Iowa. The Hawkeyes travel back to Miami to play the Panthers to start their spring campaign on Jan. 20. Having familiarity with their first opponent may make Iowa’s first match a little easier.

Despite being Iowa’s last event of the fall, the FIU Invite will present the Hawkeyes with a challenge that they have yet to encounter this season.

“I think it’s a huge thing,” senior Elise Van Heuvelen Treadwell said. “It’s going to be our first dual match in a very long time. It’ll just be awesome to have the lineup. Playing next to your teammates left, right, behind or in front [is awesome]. The expectations are just to build and learn from what we did at regionals and keep building off of that.”

Junior Danielle Burich echoed her teammates words.

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“I’m excited to be out there in a dual setting with my teammates,” Burich said. “It gets everybody a little more fired up when you have your teammates right next to you.”

The FIU Invite is unique in regards to its format. Most fall tournaments the Hawkeyes compete in are divided into multiple singles draw and doubles draw match brackets.

While the aforementioned tournaments do boast doubles matches, this is not necessarily considered team play. Singles and doubles pairs win these events, not schools. Fall events are formatted in this way to maximize the amount of preseason repetitions athletes get.

Events like the FIU Invite are designed to be incredibly barometric for programs. Such events show programs how good they actually are.

The Hawkeyes have had a positive fall. Individual highlights have come for Iowa at each tournament they have played in. This weekend, the Hawkeyes will find out if those individual highlights actually translate to wins at the team level.

Hawkeye success at the FIU Invite should serve as an indicator for an excellent regular season this spring. Fall achievement typically signifies spring prosperity.

“Hopefully we’ll get a few things sharpened before the season starts in January,” assistant coach Daniel Leitner said. “Hopefully they can have one more good tournament in Miami and then be ready for the spring.”