MANHATTAN, Kan. (The Trough) — Dispatches from the staging grounds confirm that the Kansas State women's tennis expeditionary force has broken camp, leaving the safety of the plains to conquer the unforgiving elevations of the Wasatch Range.

Survival prospects remain grim, but the mission is clear: establish a foothold in Provo, maintain a steady two-handed backhand through the altitude sickness, and execute a polite 1 p.m. volley against the BYU Cougars.

"We've lost three racquets to frostbite and morale is hanging by a 16-gauge synthetic gut string," reported Expedition Commander and Assistant Coach Elias Vance, transmitting via shortwave radio from a Delta Airlines terminal. "But we must push westward. The television executives demand we play a sport invented by 19th-century British aristocrats on the side of a frozen mountain."

The grueling trek is a direct result of the Big 12 Conference's ruthless expansion strategy, which legally requires student-athletes to traverse four time zones to play a game that will be streamed on a secondary app to an audience of 38 parents.

"Our warriors are ready to bleed for this university's television market share," said K-State Deputy Director of Attrition Margaret Halvorsen. "If we don't assert our dominance on an asphalt rectangle in Salt Lake City, the football team's broadcast rights might depreciate by a fraction of a cent."

Assuming they survive the summit, the battered survivors will immediately be airdropped into the sweltering swamps of Central Florida to do it all over again.