Young Harvard Trounces Eagles

With the ECAC Championships looming next weekend, the Harvard women’s tennis team used Saturday’s match against Boston College as a chance to show the tennis world what the young team can do, cruising to a 6-1 victory.

“Overall we played a solid match and I think we’re going to be ready to go come ECACs,” Crimson coach Traci Green said.

Harvard (3-1) started the afternoon in the Murr Center by sweeping the Eagles (2-4) in the three doubles matches to take the opening point.

Freshman Sophie Chang made quick work of her opponent at No. 5, taking the match 6-1, 6-0 in under an hour.

“I was hitting really deep and exploiting [my opponent’s] weaknesses and maximizing my strengths,” Chang said. “That helped me get off the court quickly.”

The rest of the Crimson took Chang’s example and fed off her performance.

“Sophie has been playing with a lot of focus, a lot of energy, a lot of intensity, and it’s contagious,” Green said. “That’s the part I like about it the most. So if she can continue to do that, she’ll help herself and everyone around her.”

Hideko Tachibana at No. 2 soon followed her fellow freshman’s example. After taking the first set, 6-2, Tachibana quickly fell behind 2-1 in the second set. Not to be outdone, Tachibana stole back the momentum while approaching the net with a cross-court backhand that sliced across the service boxes and well out of reach of her opponent to take the game. She went on to win the next four games to take the match and give Harvard its third point.

“She’s a ball of energy,” Green said. “We’re fortunate to have two elite players on our team, Hideko and Holly [Cao]. Their energy rubs off on everyone else, and as long as we can keep them healthy, I think we’ll be a force to be reckoned with.”

On the top court, sophomore Holly Cao, ranked first in the Northeast Region, won the clinching point for the Crimson. After falling behind 4-2 in the first set, she came back to win it 7-5 and then dominated the following one by a score of 6-1.

“Holly is a special player,” Green said. “Once again she came through for us. She clawed her way back and won the first set and then won the second set pretty easily.”

At No. 6, sophomore Samantha Gridley earned a victory in her first singles appearance of the dual-meet season. Gridley battled through a number of long rallies to down her opponent, 6-1, 6-2.

“I hadn’t played singles this season yet, so I was a little nervous coming out,” Gridley said. “After I lost the first game, I slowed down a little bit and just started playing more consistently and then was able to build up and hit harder and harder and more winners. You just have to be patient, work your cross-courts, hook them off the court, and then wait until the court is open to go down the line.”

Green commended Gridley on the way she persevered through her match.

“Sam is one of those fighter-type players,” Green said. “She will fight for every ball. She’ll be out there as long as she needs to be. That’s the kind of person you need out there.”

Junior captain Samantha Rosekrans, the only Harvard player to take the court against the Eagles in the past, opened her match at No. 4 with four consecutive winning games. Her fortune soon turned for the worse, though, as she dropped the next 12 games to lose in two sets.

Freshman Kristin Norton finished the afternoon for the Crimson in style at No. 3. After taking the first set 6-3, Norton fell behind 5-3 in the second before storming back to take four straight games and the match. The win moves Norton to 3-1 at No. 3 singles this season.

—Staff writer Eric L. Michel can be reached at emichel@fas.harvard.edu.