Women's Tennis Falls, 4-3, at Penn and Princeton

Coming into this weekend, the Harvard women’s tennis team was 2-0 in Ivy play with a solid shot at the league title.

But the Crimson was unable to continue its winning streak, losing to both Penn and Princeton on the road by a score of 4-3.

The visitors came out strong in both contests, taking two of the three doubles matches to give it a 1-0 team lead heading into singles play. But both the Quakers and Tigers outmatched Harvard in singles play, taking four of six bouts en route to their one-point team victories.

Junior Camille Jania and sophomore Natalie Blosser recorded singles wins against Penn, while junior co-captains Hideko Tachibana and Kristin Norton did the same against Princeton.

Jania, who is 16-3 on the season, also notched two doubles decisions with her senior partner Samantha Gridley at the No. 3 spot.

“We really came out on fire,” Gridley said. “We were down in a lot of matches and came back. It was really incredible.”

The results of the weekend leave the Crimson tied for fourth with Columbia in the Ivy League standings.

PRINCETON 4, HARVARD 3

After dropping its contest to Penn the day before, the Crimson lost another close contest to the Tigers, 4-3, to close out its weekend.

In doubles play, Princeton’s tandem of No. 30 Hilary Bartlett and Lindsay Graff took down No. 48 Norton and Tachibana, 8-3, before the duo of Gridley and Jania defeated their foe by the same score.

The doubles point was won by freshman Kelly Whelan and sophomore Hannah Morrill in a tiebreaker, 9-8 (9).

But trouble came in singles play for Harvard. Princeton tied up the team score quickly when Jania lost to Graff, 6-1, 6-0 at the No. 2 position.

Tachibana put her team back up by one with her 6-2, 6-3 victory at the No. 1 court, but Blosser’s 6-1, 6-2 loss and freshman Sylvia Li’s 6-3, 6-4 defeat at the No. 4 and No. 6 spots, respectively, allowed the Tigers to grab the lead.

With Princeton one match away from claiming the team victory, Norton knotted the team score at three with her 6-4, 0-6, 6-3 win at the No. 2 spot, putting the pressure on Gridley and Monica Chow at the No. 5 court.

In a back-and-forth match, Chow finished with the upper hand, 6-3, 6-7 (13), 6-4,to give her team the victory and the Crimson its second loss of the trip.

PENN 4, HARVARD 3

After jumping out to a 3-0 team lead, the Crimson looked to have the match against the Quakers in the bag.

But four-straight singles wins by Penn gave Harvard its first Ivy Season loss on Saturday.

“Against Penn, they surprised us a little bit,” Gridley said. “I think we were a little bit too comfortable.”

The day began well for the Crimson. Gridley and Jania teamed up at the No. 3 doubles spot to defeat Penn’s Stephanie Do and Emma Whitfield, 8-2.

At the No. 1 position, Tachibana and freshman Kelly Whelan dropped their bout, 8-4, putting all eyes on the No. 2 court.

In the closest doubles match of the afternoon, Norton and Morrill stuck out an 8-6 victory to give the Crimson the doubles point after their opponents came back from a three-game deficit to tie the match at six.

In singles, Jania and Blosser eased passed their foes at the No. 3 and No. 4 spots, respectively.

Jania was the first to finish with a 6-1, 6-0 win over the Quakers’ Alex Ion, while Blosser finished close behind with a 6-0, 6-2 win over Daniela DePaoli.

With four more singles matches remaining, Harvard only needed one individual victory to preserve its undefeated Ivy League record.

The first two Crimson losses came at the No. 1 and No. 5 courts. Sol Eskenazi of Penn took down Tachibana at the first spot, 6-2, 6-4, while Srinidhi Raghavan defeated Gridley at the No. 5 position, 6-4, 6-2.

Courts two and six went into three sets. At No. 6, Morrill won the first, 3-6, before losing the ensuing two, 6-4, 6-3.

With the score knotted at three, the deciding match came down to Norton at the No. 2 position.

Norton lost the first set, 6-2, but came back to tie the match at 1-1 after winning the second, 7-5. She was in the lead in the third set, 6-5, when her opponent brought the battle to a stalemate at six.

In the third-set tiebreak, Norton was unable to hold on, falling, 7-4, resulting in the Crimson’s first conference loss.

—Staff writer Taryn I. Kurcz can be reached at tkurcz13@college.harvard.edu.