San Antonio - The 13th-ranked Trinity men's tennis team begins play Friday in the 43-team NCAA Division III Championship at Claremont, California.

Trinity (16-9) plays 26th-ranked Whitman (WA) College at 10 a.m. PDT at Claremont McKenna (CA) College in the second round. The top-ranked host Claremont-Mudd-Scripps (CA) Colleges meets the University of Texas at Dallas in the other second-round matchup.

The winner of Saturday's third round match advances to the NCAA Quarterfinals May 20 at Kalamazoo, Michigan. The Semifinals and Championship are scheduled for May 21-22. The NCAA will announce the Singles and Doubles draws Wednesday with the Championships slated for May 24-26, also at Kalamazoo.

The Tigers are also ranked #2 in the West Region, while Claremont-Mudd-Scripps is #1. Whitman is ranked sixth and UT-Dallas is 16th in the Region.

Led by 10th-year Head Coach Russell McMindes, Trinity will make its 10th consecutive appearance in the NCAA Championship and the 26th overall. The Tigers earned an automatic bid by winning their 10th straight Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference Championship and the 24th in Trinity men's tennis history. That mark is the most by any program in the SCAC record books.

Last season, the Tigers opened the NCAA Championship with a second-round victory over the University of Texas at Tyler in a match played at Claremont, but host Claremont-Mudd-Scripps later eliminated Trinity in the third round.

The Tigers won the NCAA Championship in 2000 and finished third in 2014.