This past weekend was a learning experience for the women’s squash team. At the annual Ivy Scrimmages held at Princeton, the youthful and inexperienced Red was given an education in the art of Ivy League squash.
“We got beat up a little bit,” said coach Scott Stoneburgh. “It was a hard weekend.”
The first lesson was administered by Dartmouth in the form of a 9-0 shellacking. Granted, the Green was clearly on a hot streak, as it later in the day beat Princeton for the first time in recent memory. A strong Harvard team ended the Green dream in later rounds.
Cornell met the same fate in the match against Brown — a nine-match shutout. To its credit, the Red never stopped scrapping, even in the face of such a defeat. Freshman Marissa Greenwald was within two points of winning her match before the Brown player overcame her efforts. Sophomore Brooke Stetson was also tantalizingly close to victory.
“The girls were taking it on the chin, but they kept coming back at it,” said Stoneburgh.
The second day of the tournament saw more of the same; Cornell was outplayed, but not for lack of effort. The Ancient Eight boasts the highest level of squash in the nation and playing in the Ivy Scrimmages with such an inexperienced team (eight of the 10 players are underclassmen) is akin to brandishing a knife at a gunfight.
There were, however, some encouraging images from the tournament. In addition to her strong match against Brown on Saturday, Stetson turned in a victory over a Penn player in her individual bracket. Sophomore Yasmin Fahr overcame a Princeton Tiger for another Red victory in individual play.
“The girls were so supportive of each other,” said Stoneburgh. “It’s a remarkable thing to see the bond that they have together. Things are only going to get better.”
The women will travel to Philadelphia on Saturday to face Penn and Haverford, and then on to Princeton for a match on Sunday.
Archived article by Per Ostman