April 15, 2002

W. Tennis Loses Two at Home to Yale, Brown

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The women’s tennis team (11-7, 1-4) lost two close 4-3 matches this past weekend to Brown (12-4, 2-2) and Yale (13-5, 3-2) on Friday and Saturday, respectively, at Reis Tennis Center. In each of the matches, the Red split the singles contests, but failed to secure the doubles point.

The team bested Brown in its last meeting at the ECAC championship in the fall, however the netwomen fell just short of the win. The Bears opened the match by winning each of the three doubles contests 8-5.

Junior co-captain Suzanne Wright put the Red on the board with a straight-set victory at the No. 1 singles position. Junior Piper Lucas also won her singles match at the fifth position in straight sets to put the Red up 2-1. The four remaining singles contests all went to three sets, but only freshman Akane Kokubo was able to pull a victory. She won at the third slot.

No. 2 singles, sophomore Laura Leigh Tallent, who was playing in the deciding match, won the second-set tiebreaker to force a third but could not eke out the victory.

“We are both pretty [evenly-matched] teams, but Brown was the tougher team that day,” said head coach Angela Rudert. “We failed to win the majority of our three-set matches.”

Yale opened the match on Saturday by winning two of three doubles contests. Wright and Kokubo, who were both undefeated on the day, won at the No. 1 position by a close score of 9-8. Wright was again a winner in straight sets at the No. 1 singles position. Kokubo also secured a straight-set win in the No. 3 match.

No. 4 singles freshman Erika Takeuchi came from behind to win her match in three sets. Unfortunately for the Red, the Elis took the rest of the singles contests and pulled off the win by one point.

“We’re now extra hungry to win,” commented Rudert on the two tight losses, adding, “the team is not feeling dejected at all.”

Despite the two loses, Rudert was pleased all around with the team’s performance. Wright and Kokubo defeated Yale’s All-Ivy First Team Doubles players Andrea Goldberg and Elizabeth Kaufman. Kokubo remains perfect in Ivy play with a record of 5-0 and Wright also boasts an impressive 4-1 Ivy record.

The netwomen wrap up their season next weekend with a Friday contest at Penn. The team returns home on Sunday for its final match of the season against Princeton.

Archived article by Jonathan Auerbach