The Kansas Jayhawks finished their 2009 regular season without fulfilling one of the team’s primary goals: defeating the Missouri Tigers.

“We will beat Missouri,” coach Amy Hall-Holt said in an interview before the start of the season.

That did not happen, however. On March 22’s Border Showdown, the Jayhawks hosted a fervently contested dual match that resulted in a 5-2 loss to the Tigers. A few of the players were in tears afterwards.

Payback will be on the minds of the Jayhawks today when they take on the Tigers in the first round of the Big 12 Championships in Norman, Okla..

“We’re definitely pretty excited. We want to get revenge,” Hall-Holt said when the team arrived in Norman.

Getting revenge should be a lot easier now that the Jayhawks feature a newly ITA-ranked doubles pair. Senior Edina Horvath and freshman Kate Morozova won both of their doubles matches last weekend, including one against Texas’ then-No. 34 Vanja Corovic and Marija Milic. Horvath and Morozova’s conference record of 7-3 is tied for the No. 1 position in the Big 12. Ranked No. 69, they are one out of five Big 12 doubles pairs to be ranked in the nation.

“The Missouri match was a pretty close score the first time around, but I think we’ve built up a little more enthusiasm with our doubles. We’re pretty excited about getting a second chance against them,” Hall-Holt said.

Hall-Holt said defeating Missouri in the championships will make up for the regular season loss. “It’s definitely something that we want to accomplish. I think it’ll be bittersweet taking them out in the first round,” she said.

Kansas and Missouri are both 4-7 in conference play and are seeded No. 9 and 8, respectively, in the tournament. Because Missouri defeated Kansas, it received a higher seeding in the brackets. Oklahoma State defeated Missouri and lost to Kansas in the regular season, and because it was able to defeat No. 7 seeded Texas Tech, a squad that beat both Kansas and Missouri, Oklahoma State was given a higher seeding at No 6.

“If we had beaten Texas Tech, we would have had a pretty good chance of being the sixth seed. Everybody from the sixth to the ninth seed, it could have gone either way,” Hall-Holt said.

The winner of today’s match will advance to the second round tomorrow and play the No. 1 seeded Big 12 defending champion Baylor, which is 55-1 in conference play since 2005.

However, the Jayhawks’ attention is on today’s opponent.

“I don’t want to think ahead too much,” Hall-Holt said. “I definitely want to keep focus on Missouri this weekend and keep the girls’ focused on Missouri. It’s tournament time; anything can happen. Big teams go down and we’re looking to have a lot of good things happen this weekend.”

Hall-Holt knows the level of intensity at which her players can perform. She expects them to have and maintain that level today.

“You got to go in with the desire that we’re going to win at all cost. We’re going to have our A-mind out there during the whole match, and we’re going to play our game and not play others’. And that’s one thing I put out there for the girls: you lose, you go home; if you win, you keep playing,” Hall-Holt said.

— — Edited by Carly Halvorson