JACKSONVILLE — Jacksonville College will be able to add a new chapter to its sports annals on Thursday when the school's men's and women's tennis teams travel to Oklahoma City to compete in what will be the first matches ever played in school history.

The Jaguars will take on Southwestern (Okla.) Christian University, while the Lady Jaguar netters will battle national power Seminole (Okla.) Community College — the Seminole women finished No. 9 in the national last spring and opened their fall season last weekend by playing in a tournament in Wichita, Kan.

Both dual matches will get under way at 3 p.m. at the Oklahoma City Tennis Center.

JC head tennis coach Kenneth Michaud said that he knows his youngsters — there is only one sophomore (Jonathan Taylor, a transfer from Seminole Community College) on either JC team — will face a very formidable challenge, but that he is eager to get the Jags'/Lady Jags' feet wet.

“We just need to play,” he said. “Seminole is nationally ranked and they are good, but the only way to improve is by playing good competition.

“Our men are young, but they have been doing well in practice and I feel like that they are ready to go out there and to compete.”

Michaud, who has also served as tennis coach at Mesa (Ariz.) Community College, said that good things should happen for the JC teams if they their emotions on the bus and take all of their energy to the courts.

“With predominately freshmen on our team the emotions could be high being that this will their first match ,” he said. “We can't play on emotion, we have to play on energy.”

The JC teams will stay in Oklahoma City on Friday and Saturday to take part in the OKC Collegiate Open, which will also be held at the OKC Tennis Center.

Britney Sibley, one of the Lady Jags' top players, will be unavailable this week as she continues to recover from an illness.

Jacksonville College starting line-up vs. Southwestern Christian University (men)

      Doubles

No. 1-Jonathan Taylor (Nassau, Bahamas) & Daniel Apacible (Corpus Christi)

No. 2-Gil Lim (Henderson, NV) & Gabe Knight (Millsap, TX)

No. 3-Tyler Smith (Denton) & Austin Perez (Fort Worth)

      Singles

No. 1-Taylor

No. 2-Apacible

No. 3-Lim

No. 4-Perez

No. 5-Smith

No. 6-Knight

 Jacksonville College starting line-up vs. Seminole Community College (women)

      Doubles

No. 1-Kerri Kirkpatrick (Ennis) & Kaylee Hullett (Midlothian)

No. 2-Ashley Hermis (Lorena) & Kailla Parker (Groesbeck)

No. 3-Anderia Callahan (San Antonio) & Caitlan Renson (Troup)

      Singles

No. 1-Kirkpatrick

No. 2-Parker

No. 3-Hullett

No. 4-Callahan

No. 5-Renson

No. 6-Hermis