Brown Upsets Racquetwomen

The Radcliffe tennis team dropped a tough 7-2 match to a fired-up Brown squad Saturday at Providence, losing any chance it had to win the regular-season Ivy League title.

Suki Magraw at number two and Denise Thal at number three were the sole winners for the netwomen in the marathon five-hour contest. The loss drops the team's record to 4-2.

"It was really a lot closer match than the score shows," number four player Rita Funaro said last night. "We just didn't seem to have the winning drive that we needed."

Number six Ann Koufman agreed. "Everyone was tired after having to go up to Dartmouth on Thursday," she said. "Brown just seemed to be a lot more psyched up than we were."

Changing Fortunes

The Crimson's only other loss came at the hands of a strong Yale squad last Saturday in New Haven. That match had originally been viewed as the one that would probably determine the regular-season Ivy League champion.

But Brown managed to beat Yale Wednesday, which meant that the Crimson could share the title with both schools if it could defeat Brown Saturday, providing there were no further upsets by the weaker Ivy teams.

But it was not to be--the Brown squad was simply too much to handle. "Surprisingly, we didn't think they were as good as Yale was," Koufman said.

"There were a few key matches that we lost when we should have won that did it." Funaro said. One of those key matches was her own. She lost a close 6-4, 2-6, 6-3 tilt.

Another close match was in the number three doubles, where Koufman, playing with shin splints, teamed with Maude Wood in a losing effort. After splitting the first two sets, they dropped the third, decisive one, 6-2.

Today, the squad travels to Smith to take on a team that shouldn't be as tough as either Yale or Brown.