W. Tennis Heads West For Week of Fun in the Sun

Athletes at Harvard really aren’t supposed to miss more than three days of class a semester. So the Riviera/ITA All-American Championships—the first of three college national championships—which runs from Saturday, Oct. 4 to Sunday, Oct. 12 at Pacific Palisades, Calif., poses something of a problem for the Crimson women’s tennis team.

Due to their success at last year’s tournament, junior co-captain Courtney Bergman and sophomore Eva Wang were away from Cambridge for 10 days straight, which proved to be just a bit too long.

Although the professors tolerated their absences, missed lecture and make-up work proved just not to be worth the extra effort.

“Our coaches decided not to go for pre-qualifying [this year] partly due to what happened last year,” Wang said. “The trip became too long and drawn out.”

The decision not to participate in the prequalifying tournament but to bring only those players to whom a qualification berth or a tournament position was extended means that only four Harvard women will make the trip out west—co-captain Susanna Lingman, junior Alexis Martire, Bergman and Wang.

“This is an amazing opportunity for all four of us,” Martire said. “We will be competing with the best of the best. It would be foolish not to take it.”

Lingman and Bergman will be entered together in doubles as well as singles, while Martire and Wang will simply play singles, though they parterned last weekend at the Cissy Leary Invitational at the University of Pennsylvania. The pair did not play doubles together last season and one tournament together proved insufficient for developing a tandem both comfortable and capable of victory against opponents who play at the highest levels.

And that is what this Crimson quartet will be facing.

“Generally we are all around the same level,” Wang said. “We all know how to hit a ball and make it in. But what really counts is smarts and strategies on the court.”

If Harvard is to have any success this weekend, its players’ strategies in later rounds will certainly need an upgrade.

At Penn last weekend, the main problem for the Crimson was lack of aggression against higher-end opponents. Easier foes sat back, waiting for the match to come to them and rendering themselves sitting ducks for Harvard’s top swingers.

But the Crimson’s top performers were the ones who found themselves in the crosshairs as they advanced through to later rounds. Since many of Harvard’s top performenrs were unwilling to assert themselves, they were defeated, in several cases bowing out earlier than they should have.

“I had some trouble in the beginning with my second round opponent,” Martire said. “But ultimately I was able to bounce back and win the consolation which boosted my confidence. It was the first tournament of the year and it felt good to get some wins under my belt.”

And with much of the team still rusty from a summer’s-worth of time off, gaining confidence and reaching the same comfort levels as during last year’s spectacular team-season run is what these early tournaments are for.

Finishing papers and brushing up on missed lessons are for the flight back.

—Staff writer Timothy J. McGinn can be reached at mcginn@fas.harvard.edu.