April 27, 2004

DALLAS-Texas A&M senior Lester Cook of Sherman Oaks, Calif., Oklahoma junior Anda Perianu of Braila, Romania, and Texas freshman Petra Dizdar of Split, Croatia, have been chosen as Big 12 Conference Men's and Co-Women's Tennis Players of the Week for matches of Apr. 20-26, the conference office announced Tuesday.

Cook nabbed his 14th singles victory in the last 15 matches last week with a 6-4, 6-2 triumph over No. 29 nationally Mark Van Elden of Oklahoma State. The No. 14 tennisman in the country advanced to 6-1 at No. 1 singles in Big 12 matches and rose to a team-best 29-8 overall (19-4 in dual match singles).

Perianu clinched the No. 1 singles position medal in Big 12 play with a 3-0 record in singles over Oklahoma State's Katya Kolodynska 7-5, 7-5, Iowa State's Sabrina Evers 6-0, 6-1, and No. 75 Gitte Ostermann of Nebraska 6-1, 6-0 while teaming with Heather Saluri to win all their of their doubles contests. She is ranked No. 5 nationally in singles and 17th in TTA doubles with Saluri.

Dizdar, a candidate for National Freshman of the Year, also had a 3-0 week and paced Texas to the undisputed Big 12 women's championship with a 11-0 mark in dual league activity. Her most dramatic win came over Texas A&M ace Jessica Roland as she rallied from 4-0 down in the third set to edge the Aggies' No. 1 player 2-6, 6-4, 7-6. That clinched a 4-3 team win for Texas over the Aggies in College Station before over 1,200 fans and paved the way for UT to sweep past Texas Tech 7-0 and Kansas 4-1 for the conference crown. Dizdar was 3-0 in singles and 2-1 in doubles for the week.