Tallahassee, Fla, – The second-ranked Florida State Seminoles will travel to Tampa this weekend to compete in the Tampa Invitational March 4-5. Florida State comes into the weekend 5-0 after going undefeated at the Seminole Beach Bash this past weekend.
The Seminoles will face three ranked opponents and two who are currently unranked in Tampa, taking on No. 6 Grand Canyon, No. 11 Stetson, and No. 3 TCU as well as Florida Gulf Coast and the University of Tampa. The Noles continue CCSA conference play with their match against TCU and GCU.
FSU will kick off the weekend on Saturday against Grand Canyon at 12:00 p.m. GCU is coming off a 3-1 opening weekend in Los Angeles, where they defeated No. 14 Long Beach State 3-2, CSUN 5-0, and Concordia (Calif.) 5-0, before dropping a close 3-2 loss to host No. 4 USC. The Noles are 8-0 all-time against GCU with the last meeting coming last year at the March to May Tournament in Gulf Shores, Ala. where FSU won 3-1.
The Seminoles’ second match will be against No. 11 Stetson at 4:00 p.m., which will be the 19th meeting between the two with FSU winning all 18 previous meetings. Last season, the Seminoles beat Stetson twice, 3-2 at the Sun-N-Sand Invitational and 4-1 at the Unconquered Invitational. The Hatters enter the weekend undefeated after beating Mercer, No. 13 FAU, FGCU, and North Florida at their home tournament on opening weekend.
On Sunday, the Seminoles take on No. 3 TCU at 10:00 a.m. TCU is coming off an undefeated (5-0) opening weekend at the Third Coast College Classic Tournament, besting UAB, Houston Christian, Texas A&M Corpus Christi, and Central Arkansas. The Seminoles lead the all-time series against the Horned Frogs 14-3. The two teams last met in last year’s CCSA Championship match where the Noles took home the trophy with a 3-1 win.
Next, the Seminoles take on Florida Gulf Coast at 2:00 p.m. Florida State is 3-0 all-time against FGCU which enters the Tampa Invitational 2-2 after beating North Florida and Mercer and losing to No. 13 FAU and No. 11 Stetson. The last time these two teams faced off in the sand was in 2021 when Florida State won 5-0.
The last match of the invitational pits Florida State against home-standing Tampa at 4:00 p.m. Tampa enters the weekend 1-3 after losing to Charleston, No. 8 Georgia State, and Tusculum, with a win over Jacksonville. The Noles are 6-0 all-time when facing Tampa.
Schedule
March 4th
12:00 PM No. 6 Grand Canyon
4:00…