The Cornell women’s tennis team traveled to Princeton on Friday and Saturday to compete in the ECAC Division I Women’s Invitational Tennis Championships.
The tournament featured a format with 16 seeded and unseeded teams. Defending champ and host school Princeton entered the tournament as the first seed, with the University of Virginia second, Harvard, Pennsylvania, Boston University, James Madison, Temple and Yale entering as the third through eighth seeds, respectively.
Joining Cornell as the unseeded teams were Army, Brown, Columbia, Georgetown, Rutgers, Seton Hall, and West Virginia.
On Friday, Cornell lost a close first-round match to Boston University. Senior Ngozi Amobi and freshman Kate Sternberg recorded Cornell’s only two singles victories in a 5-2 loss. Sophomores Daniela DelPrete and Piper Lucas joined for a 8-5 victory in doubles play. Amobi and Sternberg combined for a doubles match in which they were narrowly defeated 8-7, and Delprete and sophomore Nicole Chiu also played tough matches.
In Saturday play, Cornell faced Rutgers and Columbia. In its match against Rutgers, the Red stepped up its play and won 6-1. The match featured singles victories from DelPrete, Lucas, Amobi, and Sternberg, along with another 8-5 doubles victory from DelPrete and Lucas and a 8-6 victory from a partnership of Amobi and Sternberg.
The Red then faced tough competition from unseeded Columbia. Lucas and Chiu won their singles matches in three sets and two sets, respectively. In doubles action, DelPrete and Lucas combined for an 8-3 spanking. Cornell ended the weekend with a 12th place finish.
In other tournament action, Princeton was defeated by second-ranked Virginia in the semifinals, who went on to win the tournament and a free pass to the ITA National Team Indoor Championships at the University of Wisconsin in February.
The Red finishes up its fall season November 4-7 when it competes at William and Mary in the ITA Individual Regionals.
Archived article by Katherine Granish