For the past 13 years, the Julie Abraham Memorial Tennis Tournament has provided a welcome benefit for Vicksburg’s public programs.

On Friday at 3:30 p.m. at the Halls Ferry Courts, Vicksburg High, Warren Central and St. Aloysius will use the Abraham Tournament as the final tune-up in preparation of next week’s State Tournament at Parham Bridges in Jackson.

“This tournament gives all the teams a good start toward the state tournament. It’s a good warm-up event,” said Freddy Abraham, the father of Julie Abraham, who died on Christmas Day in 1989 during her freshman year at Ole Miss.

Julie Abraham was a graduate of St. Aloysius and played tennis for the Flashes.

“We started this tournament about three years after Julie’s death. And we felt it was a fitting thing that all three schools compete in it. But it wasn’t our idea,” Freddy Abraham said. “It was actually Mr. Bruce at Vicksburg High who came up with the idea.”

Besides the competitive tune-up, the tournament plays another important role.

“For the past 10 years, we’ve used the proceeds from the tournament to fund a scholarship award for a Vicksburg area student,” said Abraham of the scholarship that will go to a student who plans to attend Ole Miss.

Competitively, both WC tennis coach Rick Shields and VHS coach Kevin Manton are looking forward to Friday’s tournament.

“With (5A) state starting Monday, this is a good event because we get match-play before the state tournament,” Manton said. “And it should be pretty competitive. We only beat St. Al 3-2 in the match we had last week and it was 4-1 against Warren Central. We’ll be without our boys doubles team, but I’ll just move up our JV doubles.”

The top player in the field should be VHS singles player Jordan Henry. Henry was the 5A runner-up last year and he’ll look to use the Abraham tournament as a tune-up for a run at the state boys singles crown.

“This tournament helps us get ready for state,” Shields said. “We have confidence because we’ve done well against both teams during the year. St. Al beat us 2-3 but we were missing a couple of players.”