Women's Tennis Players Shake off Rust at Tourney

Harvard women’s tennis wrapped up the USTA Billie Jean Invitational in Flushing, N.Y. yesterday.

As a whole, the team did not perform as well as it would have liked, but the tournament provided many positives for the team.

“I think we’re going in the right direction,” co-captain Samantha Rosekrans said. “We only had half of our team here this weekend. We have a very deep squad this year, and we have strong leadership from the sophomores and juniors.”

“We have more experience this year,” the co-captain continued. “I think we will have a strong showing at regionals [starting Oct. 22].”

Rosekrans battled throughout the weekend, defeating Charleston Southern’s Marija Dzakovic, 6-1, 6-2, losing to Cornell’s Christina Ordaway in a tie break, 6-3, 5-7, 11-9, and also falling to Liberty’s Jordan Jenkins, 6-4, 6-1.

“I probably didn’t play the greatest, because I haven’t been practicing singles,” Rosekrans said. “But overall it was a good tournament. It’s a great experience to play at the U.S. Open courts, and the weather was great for us all weekend. The competition was pretty solid.”

Crimson coach Traci Green echoed this sentiment, also expressing confidence in the team’s captain.

“Sam hasn’t played a lot of singles this semester, so I feel like she’s still really rusty,” Green said. “She’s working on things in her game. I’m really not worried about her at all.”

Junior Samantha Gridley played the strongest in singles competition this weekend for Harvard, winning all three of her matches, as well as her flight.

Gridley defeated Army’s Annie Hang, 6-1, 6-1, in the quarterfinals, Columbia’s Tiana Takenaga in the semifinals, 6-2, 6-2, and Binghamton’s Marina Bykovskaya, 6-3, 7-5, in the final.

“I knew I wanted to be really focused and be consistent,” Gridley said. “I wanted to limit my errors. In the match, [Bykovskaya] was a little more feisty then the other opponents I played. She made a couple tight calls. In the end, it was a battle of will, but I was able to pull it out.”

Gridley, playing in her first tournament this year, was happy to start her season with such success. The junior was especially happy with her performance in the final, in which she came back from a 5-1 second-set deficit.

“It’s a confidence builder to win matches and tournaments. I know I can pull out a match when I’m down by a lot now. It gives me confidence that I can fight out any match.”

Gridley’s play equally impressed Green.

“Samantha Gridley competed extremely well this weekend,” Green said. “It was great to see that her hard work in practice paid off. She was great in all her matches, and she had that ‘never say die’ attitude throughout the tournament.”

Gridley’s play also impressed her teammates, especially Rosekrans.

“We watched her play the finals today—stellar performance overall. She had a really long match and fought it out. She came back from being down in the second set, so we were all very proud,” Rosekrans said.

Green viewed the invitational as another method of preparation for the approaching regionals competition, which will be a key tournament for Crimson tennis this fall.

“This was only our second tournament for some people,” Green said. “Hopefully we can put the time in over the next couple weeks training-wise so we can challenge at regionals. We competed fairly well this weekend. I feel like we were still rusty and definitely need to put some time in over the next couple weeks to prepare for the tournaments ahead.”

Freshman Natalie Blosser teamed up with classmate Hannah Morrill to go 2-1 in doubles. In singles, both Morrill and Blosser went 2-1 as well. Sophomore Alex Lehman lost the two matches she completed but advanced in one due to her opponent’s injury.

Gridley and Lehman paired in doubles, defeating Diamond Adams and Nakita Austin of St. John’s in the round of 16, 8-2.

The tandem then topped Fairleigh Dickinson’s Egzona Morina and Julia Prantl in the quarterfinals, 8-5, before falling to Boston College’s Alex Kelleher and Erina Kikuchi in the semifinals, 8-0.

The tough play of Gridley’s teammates inspired her, though she also saw room for improvement.

“I think there were a few nerves on the first day, especially for the freshmen, but it was great to see people improve,” Gridley said. “Alex had a tough match the first day but then came out and played strong the next day. And same with Natalie and Sam [Rosekrans].”