Volume 117 >> Issue 47 : Friday, October 3, 1997

PDF of This Issue

Women's Tennis Loses to Smith, But Sweeps Babson College, 8P0

Last Saturday, the MIT women's tennis team faced Smith College in a difficult match. Smith came out strong, winning all the doubles matches in the beginning of the tournament. The first doubles team of Mealani Nakamura '00 and Nora Humphrey '98 was defeated 8­4. The second doubles team of Lauren Germain '01 and Michelle Youn '00 as well as the third doubles of Tiffany Cunningham '98 and Nisha Singh '00 suffered similar fates, losing 8­5 and 8­4 respectively.

Despite the losses, the players went on to compete hard in the singles matches. Unfortunately, "Smith has very good depth," said coach Merrilee Keller, and Smith took all but one singles match.

Youn, in the first singles slot, suffered a hard loss; however in second singles, Nakamura captured MIT's only point in the competition with a 6­4, 6­1 victory. Third singles Humphrey lost 6­4, 6­3, and the fifth and sixth singles players, Singh and Germain, also met with defeat. Cunningham, in the fourth singles slot, played a tough match, losing closely in a 7­0 tie breaker; the match score was 6­7, 3­6, 7­6.

Co-captain Singh said that "the team played well and tried hard, despite the fact that we were not playing at the top of our games."

Babson win follows Smith loss

Saturday's loss to Smith was wiped away with a resounding victory over Babson College on Tuesday. MIT shut out Babson, winning all doubles and singles matches.

In the doubles competition, the first doubles team (Nakamura and Youn) beat their competitors 8­4. The second doubles team (Humphrey and Hannah Kwon '00) demolished Babson with an 8­1 victory. Playing third doubles, Germain and Singh also came out victorious with a score of 8­5.

In the singles bracket, MIT dominated for the most part. At first singles, Nakamura only let one game fall to her opponent. At second singles, Youn asserted herself and crushed her opponent with a swift victory of 6­0, 6­0. Humphrey, Kwon, and Singh also dominated their matches, winning 6­3, 6­2; 6­1, 6­2; and 6­4, 6­0 respectively. At the sixth doubles spot, Germain came back from a 5­1 deficit to defeat her opponent 7­6 (7­4), 6­3. Playing both seventh and eight singles, Katy Kaminski '01 captured two wins, both with the score of 8­3.

The team is doing well so far, with a conference record of 3­1; the non-conference record is 0­2.