Women's Tennis Notches Back-to-Back Wins Over Weekend

The Harvard women’s tennis team continued to roll this weekend, as the Crimson pushed its home win streak to five matches with victories over Boston University and Syracuse. The win over the Orange also marked the 100th victory in head coach Traci Green’s career.

This weekend saw dominant performances from the Harvard women (4-1), as the match against BU (3-2) was called after four matches to give the Crimson a 4-0 win, and the team took a 6-1 decision over Syracuse (0-5). In both matches, Harvard was boosted by the strong play of the 34th-ranked doubles team of freshmen Spencer Liang and Monica Lin, who dispatched their opponents in one set on both days.

“I think we had a really successful weekend,” Liang said. “Everyone fought really hard, and of course we got the results that we wanted—we won both matches, which was exciting to see.”

HARVARD 6, SYRACUSE 1

After playing a shortened match against BU, the Crimson proved it could still fight through a full set of matches when it took down Syracuse by a sizeable 6-1 tally on Sunday. The team took two of three doubles matches and five of six singles to come away with the victory.

Liang and Lin started the match off strong, as the team took down the Syracuse duo of Maddie Kobelt and Valeria Salazar in a 6-2 decision. The Orange quickly tied the match up, as senior Hannah Morrill and freshman June Lee fell to Amanda Rodgers and Komal Safdar in a close 6-4 set at second doubles.

“Mentally and physically, [your mindset] is just different in the longer matches,” Lee said. “With BU, we knew that we stopped after four matches, but mentally we still had to fight for every point and know that it could go either way at any time in the match. Today we obviously had to play it out, and it was going to be more tiring physically, but we also tried to stay really tough mentally.”

After sophomore Amanda Lin and junior Sylvia Li won at third doubles to give Harvard the doubles point and put the Crimson up, 1-0, the match turned to singles play. Harvard quickly wrapped up the contest, winning three of the first four matches.

Monica Lin was the first to finish her match, as she quickly dispatched Kobelt at second singles to give the Crimson the first singles point, and Lee also won her match at third singles in two sets. After Morrill was defeated by Breanna Bachini at fifth singles to give Syracuse its only point of the match, it fell to Liang to give Harvard its fourth point. She succeeded, beating Rodgers in a third set tiebreaker to clinch the match for Harvard.

“[Rodgers] was very tall and she was a lefty, and she was just overall a good player,” Liang said. “I took the first set, 6-2, and then she fought back and won, 6-3. Even though I lost the set I just stayed calm and just kept fighting, and my teammates helped me stay intense and inspired me to fight for them.”

Amanda Lin and Amy He also recorded wins for the Crimson to finish off the 6-1 victory.

HARVARD 4, BOSTON UNIVERSITY 0

On Saturday, Harvard blanked the visiting Terriers from BU, winning the doubles point and the first three singles matches in straight sets to make quick work of the match.

“We had amazing energy,” Lee said. “We were really focused, but we were cheering each other on so much. It was amazing, it was so loud on the court all the time. You could just feel the support.”

Liang and Lin took the first doubles match in a 6-3 decision, and Morrill and Lee followed suit with their own 6-3 victory at second doubles to secure the doubles point for Harvard. The match then moved into the singles, where the Crimson continued its dominant play. Morrill swept Sami Lieb with 6-0 and 6-1 victories and was followed quickly by Lin’s 6-1, 6-3 win at second singles to put Harvard one point away from a victory.

Lee wrapped up the match with her second win of the day, a 6-2, 6-1 victory over Leonie-Charloette Athanasiadis. All other matches in progress were stopped after Harvard clinched the match in a 4-0 victory.

“I’m just looking to stay aggressive throughout the whole match and stay positive,” Lee said. “I think as a team our goal is just going to make sure that we support each other and make each other play as best as we can.”

—Staff writer Glynis K. Healey can be reached at ghealey@college.harvard.edu.

—Staff writer Glynis K. Healey can be reached at ghealey@college.harvard.edu.