Grigg Ends Career With Individual Gold

Harvard senior Kyla Grigg capped off a remarkable career and an undefeated season by defeating Penn’s Kristen Lange in the title match of the College Squash Association Individual Championships yesterday in Philadelphia.

Grigg, the draw’s No. 1 seed, claimed the national title in four games against the seventh-seeded Lange, winning 9-5, 7-9, 9-3, 9-5.

The Crimson star was playing in her third consecutive national title match after finishing runner-up the past two years. Although Grigg was the heavy favorite this time around, she said that it was anything but easy.

“I had to work really hard that whole match,” she said. “There were no easy points.”

The third and fourth games were filled with long rallies.

In what proved to be the deciding game, Grigg found herself facing a 5-1 hole, but was able to fight back and knot the score at 5.

“I was serving,” Grigg said, “and I thought, ‘Oh my gosh, I’m four points away from the national title.’”

Harvard coach Satinder Bajwa praised Grigg’s consistency over a grueling three-day period in which she had to play five matches.

“She managed to play her highest level of squash for every match,” he said. “In the past she has sometimes slipped. This was the first weekend she went through everything in a very consistent and diligent manner.”

Grigg was relatively unchallenged in her first two matches, but both the quarterfinal and semifinal matches were extended to four games.

She said those matches, in which she defeated Yale’s Miranda Ranieri (9-6, 9-4, 4-9, 9-3) and Trinity’s Vaidehi Reddy (1-9, 9-2, 9-1, 9-1), were as tough physically as the championship match, but not nearly as mentally challenging.

“I was much more nervous for the final match,” she said.

Lange, her opponent in the final, advanced past the quarterfinals by defeating former Harvard standout and second seed Lily Lorentzen, who transferred to Stanford last year after winning the individual national title as a freshman with the Crimson.

In last year’s title match, Lorentzen staved off a ferocious comeback attempt from then-teammate Grigg, winning in five games, 9-7, 9-3, 0-9, 0-9, 9-7.

Lorentzen was ineligible for team play at Stanford this season due to her status as a transfer. Bajwa said that this was likely the cause of Lorentzen’s disappointing showing.

“I felt that Lily didn’t have that structure that one needs to play successfully,” he said. “She wasn’t able to play regularly. I thought that would have hurt her coming to Individuals, and it probably did.”

Grigg seemed noncommittal at the prospect of facing an ex-teammate in a No. 1 vs. No. 2 rematch of last year’s title match.

“To be honest, I didn’t really think about it,” she said, “I was focused on my own game.”

Three others players competed for the Crimson.

Junior Supriya Balsekar advanced to the quarterfinals with victories over Penn’s Radhika Ahluwalia and Princeton’s Claire Rein-Weston before falling to Reddy in four games.

Junior Jennifer Blumberg defeated the Tigers’ Casey Riley but lost to Lange in the Round of 16.

And senior Audrey Duboc, recently recovered from the flu, edged Williams’ Toby Eyre in five games in the opening round. But Lorentzen proved too tough to overcome in the Round of 16, as Duboc’s former teammate continued her march to the semifinals with a four-game win.

—Staff writer Karan Lodha contributed to the reporting of this story.