SAN DIEGO – San Diego State women's tennis head coach Peter Mattera has announced the addition of Yasmine Kabbaj to the program. Kabbaj arrives at SDSU after spending the past two years at Florida International University.
"We are thrilled to be bringing Yasmine to The Mesa," head coach Peter Mattera said. "We feel very passionately that she will raise the level of the entire team through her hard work, high-level experience, and tremendous talent. We are excited to bring her on board and to have her help us achieve our goals of raising our national prominence and securing another Mountain West Conference Championship."
Kabbaj earned multiple accolades at Florida International during her two years on campus. The Moroccan international earned first team All-CUSA for both singles and doubles in 2023, was named singles player of CUSA Championship in 2023, earned Conference USA Freshman of the Year in 2022, was placed on the CUSA all-freshman team in 2022, and earned All-CUSA second team honors in singles play.
Over the course of her two seasons at FIU Kabbaj posted a 54-20 record (.730 winning percentage) across singles and doubles play. In singles play alone the Moroccan won an impressive 27 matches in 36 attempts (.750 winning percentage), while winning an additional 27 matches in doubles play out of 38 matches (.711 winning percentage). Kabbaj went 11-6 in dual singles at No. 1 position during her sophomore season, and went 17-5 at No. 2 doubles alongside Oyinlomo Quadre. The duo was also ranked as high as No. 56 in doubles nationally by the ITA during the 2023 season. As for her freshman season Kabbaj received All-CUSA singles second team honors, went 16-3 in dual singles and 10-6 in dual doubles. She finished 13-2 at No. 1 singles and 3-1 at No. 2 singles and 11 of 13 victories came in straight sets in 2022.
"We are delighted to announce the signing of Yasmine Kabbaj," associate head coach Nicolas Vinel said. "She is one of the best players in the country and comes to SDSU with a plethora of high-level college tennis experience. On top of that, she had an amazing summer playing in pro events with some phenomenal performances, such as winning her second senior title. She reached her career best No. 611 in the world and will bring her professionalism to our team and help us get better every day. We are so excited for the future and to welcome her into the Aztec family."
Prior to FIU, Kabbaj was a standout player in Africa. She earned back-to-back semifinal performances in a pair of tournaments in South Africa and collected five singles in 2020 alone. Kabbaj also won the Tournoi ITF Junior Meknes Ismailia in her home country of Morocco and the J5 Cario in Egypt. In doubles action, Kabbaj recently won the J3 Pretoria in South Africa, while finishing runner-up at the JB2 Pretoria the following week. Kabbaj also competed for Morocco in the 2019 Junior Fed Cup, knocking off three teams in doubles play and earning a singles victory as well. Overall, Kabbaj has competed in three Junior Fed Cups, with the earliest coming when she was 14 years old.