CAPE GIRARDEAU, Mo. - Southeast Missouri's women's tennis team opens its 2012 season with a pair of matches this weekend. The Redhawks will play at Arkansas State Saturday and Central Arkansas Sunday.

Southeast will play four-straight road matches to start the year.

The Redhawks enter the season picked seventh in the Ohio Valley Conference's Preseason Poll. Elizabeth Nyenwe and Nikole Novikova were each rated among the league's Top-10 players.

Nyenwe, the first Southeast player to be named the OVC Freshman of the Year last season, was ranked fourth. Novikova, a First-Team All-OVC selection, was 10th. Nyenwe went 9-7 overall and 7-1 in OVC play at the No. 2 single spot, while Novikova fashioned an 8-8 record at the top singles position in 2011. The two accounted for all but 10 of Southeast's singles victories.

Fellow returnees Laura Garcia and Lauren Schaper, along with newcomers Jessica Courtnell, Melissa Martin and Heather Robinson form the rest of this year's team.