The women’s tennis team swept all six singles matches and won one of three doubles matches to end the weekend with a 7-2 overall victory against the Bates College Bobcats. Because Bates made the NESCAC tournament last season and the Cardinals didn’t, this weekend’s win went a ways towards solidifying Wesleyan as one of the top six teams in the conference.
The match, played at Bates in Lewiston, Maine, was the Cards’ first NESCAC match of the year.
Despite their talent, the Cards’ first-ranked doubles team of Madalina Ursu ’09 and Anika Fischer ’10 fell 6-8 to Bates’s all-NESCAC duo of Cecilia Grissa/Laura Harris. That was followed by a loss for Wesleyan’s second ranked doubles team of Rachael Ghorbani ’09 and Emily Fish ’09, who lost in their match 4-8 to the Bobcats’ Caryn Benisch /Alexandra Piacquad. The last pair of doubles on the team, Ania Preneta ’09 and Alex Sirois ’09, was victorious in an 8-2 match over Liz Fleming/Lindsey Scherer.
Preneta, the number one singles player, was the only two-time winner, taking her singles match in straight sets, 6-0, and 7-5 over Grissa.
The Cards went on to dominate in their singles matches. Ursu lost her first set 6-7 but said a first-set loss often “pumps [her] up even more.”
“[If I] can be mentally powerful enough to get over [losing the first set tie break], I can easily win the rest,” Ursu said.
She used the loss as motivation in the next two sets, going 6-1, 6-2 and ultimately defeating Benisch.
The third-ranked Ghobrani was victorious over Piacquad in her 6-4, 6-0 match. Fischer continued the Cards’ success, finishing with a 7-5, 6-4 game over Harris while Fish won a tie break in the first set, 7-6 and won the second set 6-4 over Fleming.
Casey Simchick ’10 also won her first varsity match, claiming a 6-2, 6-1 over Scherer to complete the Cards’ successful trip to Maine.
“[It was] definitely our best win this season, by far,” captain Tori Santuro ’07 said.
After falling to Wellesley 5-4 in late September, the team improved to a dual-match record of 2-2. Tuesday, the Cards host their last home match of the regular season, facing conference opponent Connecticut College who, last year, took a 9-0 decision over Wesleyan in what Santuro called a “tough match.” However she feels this year’s team has a good chance to beat them and is excited about the match.
Ten days later, the team will travel to Amherst to compete in the NEWITT Championships.
Leave a Reply