For the first time in history, the women’s tennis team posted consecutive winning seasons with a final record of 11-7.
The Lady Cardinals finished up the season with convincing wins over Hamilton, Smith, and Mount Holoyoke, yielding just one match over the three-game span. Despite the historic feat of consecutive winning seasons, the Cards were edged out of the NESCAC Tournament for the second year in a row.
In the season finale against Mount Holoyoke, the Lady Cards were forced to play without two key starters in Anika Fischer ’10, who was sidelined with a dislocated arm, and Madalina Ursu ’09, who was unable to attend the match. Nonetheless, the Cards pulled out a gutsy 8-1 win, highlighted by come-from-behind victories from Rachael Ghorbani ’09 at second singles and Casey Simchik ’10 at fourth singles.
After Ghorbani, who moved up to second singles with Ursu out of the lineup, dropped the first set 3-6, she used her forceful groundstrokes to blank her opponent 6-0 in the second set before taking the match in a third set tiebreaker. At fourth singles, Simchik struggled at the start of the match, as she dropped the first set 0-6, but regained her composure and her consistency as she cruised through the final two sets 6-0, 6-3.
Also recording victories in singles for the Cards in the final match of the season were Ania Prenetta ’09 at first singles, Alex Sirois ’09 at fifth singles, and Lizzie Collector ’09 at sixth singles. The Cards also swept all three doubles positions at the beginning of the match.
“I think the team pulled together, especially with some people out,” Collector said. “We did what we had to do and beat them pretty badly. It was a huge way to end the season.”
In the two preceding matches, the Lady Cardinals had little trouble with Hamilton and Smith, as the squad trounced the Continentals by a 5-0 margin before scoring a 9-0 win over Smith on April 20.
Despite the 11-7 mark and second consecutive winning season, the Lady Cardinals were left empty-handed as the NESCAC Tournament seedings were announced. The squad finished eighth in the conference, with the top six teams qualifying for the tournament. One match which the Cards may look back on was the conference match-up with Connecticut College, in which the Cards fell in heartbreaking fashion by a 5-4 decision. Equally devastating was a 6-3 loss at the hands of Trinity, a team the Lady Cardinals defeated 8-1 a year ago.
“Our winning record was satisfying, but we should have beaten Conn. College and Trinity,” Simchik said. “Trinity improved a lot from a year ago. If we had beaten Trinity, we would have made the NESCACs. The Conn. College one was disappointing because had we played Conn. in the spring, their number one player is injured so we would have probably beaten them.”
Although the tennis team was downed by Williams and Amherst, two NESCAC powerhouses, by 9-0 scores during the season, Simchik exclaimed that although the Cardinals failed to win a match, many of the matches were closer than the scores indicated.
“We didn’t get enough credit that even though we lost 9-0, they were all good matches,” Simchik said. “Yeah we did lose, but they were good matches and we learned from them. The competition makes us better. It was helpful to see people that good and then to play better against the not-as-strong teams at the end of the year.”
Leading the way for the Lady Cardinals this year were three sophomores who gained key experience at the top singles spots, Prenetta, Ursu and Ghorbani. Ursu scored one of the toughest victories of the season in her second singles match against Vassar, a come-from-behind 0-6, 7-6, 6-3 victory against one of the top teams in the region. Both Ghorbani and Ursu claimed winning records on the year, with Ghorbani sporting a 9-8 record while Ursu finished with an 8-7 mark. Playing against the toughest competition all year at the number one singles spot, Prenetta finished with a respectable 7-12 mark on the season.
The bottom of the singles lineup saw key contributions from three first-year players in Anika Fischer ’10, Meredith Holmes ’10, and Simchik. Behind a powerful serve and penetrating groundstrokes, Fischer led the squad in wins on the year with 10. Fischer’s all-court game and experience at the fourth singles position should propel her to the top of the singles lineup next year. Holmes and Simchik stepped into the starting lineup with the departure of Emily Fish ’09 and an injury to Tori Santuro ’07. Simchik finished with the best winning percentage on the team with a 9-3 record.
According to Collector, the freshmen, Fischer in particular, picked up their level of play in the spring season.
“I was really impressed with Anika, the difference between her two seasons,” Collector said. “She was nervous in the first half, but she stepped up her game and got into her groove and loosened up a bit. All of a sudden in the spring, she was dominating.”
Also making key contributions in doubles were Sirois and Collector, who also served as serviceable singles substitutions. Collector teamed with Prenetta at third doubles and finished with a team-best 9-4 mark, while Sirois joined Ghorbani at second doubles to record six wins and six losses on the year.
The women’s tennis team has reason to be optimistic for the future with the young talent in the freshman and sophomore classes. The Cards will return every starter from this year’s squad, and each member of the team has gained key experience in both the singles and doubles lineups, which should spell success for the next few years.
“It can only get better,” Simchik said. “It’s good that we’ll all be here for a while, we’ll have time to grow as a team and be a solid force. It can only mean that we’ll get better in the next few years.”
“Next year will be promising, we had a really young team this year,” Collector said. “I think that next year we’re expecting at least one good recruit, so she’ll help, and the entire team has more experience for next year.”
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