Eudice Chong ’18 is good. Like, really good. After going undefeated last year, Chong didn’t miss a beat last weekend at the Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) regional tournament. In singles, she dropped just one out of 11 sets before reaching the final. There, Chong faced a familiar opponent—her doubles partner, Victoria Yu ’19. All-American Chong was unfazed, however, winning the match 6-2, 6-2. This moment marked the first time a Wesleyan student has reached the ITA regional finals, and there were two of them. Last year Chong was unavailable for the ITA Tournament as she was busy representing her native Hong Kong in the quadrennial Asian Games.
“I’m extremely happy for the girls and proud of their efforts,” said Head Coach Mike Fried. “It’s a tremendous, historic accomplishment for both Eudice and Victoria as well as the Wesleyan women’s tennis program.”
After competing across the net, Chong and Yu had to team up for the second half of the tournament.
“The transition was definitely tough, especially because the mindset of having to play a close teammate is so different from playing an opponent from another school,” said Chong. “After our singles match, we made sure to keep ourselves pumped up and energetic. All we could really do was put the final behind us and concentrate on playing good doubles.”
Seeded fourth overall, Chong and Yu battled their way to the doubles title. After a rocky start, a tight 8-5 victory of Cancio/Bush of Williams, the Eu/Yu duo had a strong showing down the stretch, beating top seeded Ip/Ghosh of Amherst in the semifinals, 8-2, and second-seeded Cheng/Likhanskaia of Bowdoin 8-4 in the final.
“I was really looking forward to playing this tournament because I didn’t get to participate in it last year,” said Chong in her postgame comments. “It’s such an honor to be representing Wes, especially having such great teammates cheering you on through every point. I managed to play good tennis throughout most of the weekend, and I’m glad I got the win. Playing the singles final against a teammate right before we had to play doubles together was very tough mentally, but I’m glad we managed to pull through and win the doubles as well. I’m so excited to be playing in the national ITAs in a couple of weeks, and hopefully Victoria and I both get some great results.”
Yu shared Chong’s excitement about the year ahead.
“I’m very excited to be part of this incredible Wes tennis family,” she said. “To start off my time here at Wes with a great run at the ITAs is so memorable. I can’t wait to represent Wes at the national level, and I’m so looking forward to the rest of the season and beyond.”
Wesleyan’s three other singles players had mixed results. Nicole McCann ’18 breezed by a Mount Holyoke opponent 6-1, 6-3 before falling to Miller of Tufts in a tough 0-6, 2-6 contest. Helen Klass-Warch ’18 came up short against Babson College’s Akgul 5-7, 2-6, and Dasha Dubinsky ’18 was unsuccessful against NCAA tournament runner-up Likhanskaia of Bowdoin, losing by a score of 4-6,0-6.
Klass-Warch and Dubinsky also competed in doubles, defeating Das/Zhu of MIT 8-3 before being blanked by Calla/Chen of Amherst 8-0.
“We had tough opponents,” Klass-Warch explained. “That’s why we lost. But my friends won. So in my heart I won too.”
Aashli Budhiraja ’18 remained out of action last weekend, as her eye continues to heal from an unfortunate incident with a cactus. The timetable for her return remains uncertain.
While the rest of the team begins their winter training in preparation for the spring season, Chong and Yu will travel to Sumpter, South Carolina in two weeks to compete in the ITA Indoor Nationals by virtue of their performances at the ITA regional tournament.