TENNIS: Mixed weekend for men’s and women’s
Yale’s men’s tennis team fell to St. John’s University on Saturday, but dominated Boston University on Sunday in the Elm City. The women’s tennis team lost to Columbia and Brown, but defeated Cornell on Saturday at the ECAC Indoor Championships.
muscosportsphotos.com
The Yale men’s tennis team (4–2, 0–0 Ivy) hosted St. John’s University (6–1, 0–0 Big East) on Saturday and Boston University (0–5, 0–0 Patriot) on Sunday, while the women’s team (3–4, 0–0 Ivy) traveled to Ithaca, New York where they battled Columbia University (5–2, 0–0), Cornell University (0–5, 0–0) and Brown University (3–4, 0–0) in the ECAC Indoor Championships.
While the men’s team fell to St. John’s (2–5), the squad quickly bounced back in its match against Boston University, taking all seven points.
“I thought many of our guys played with a lack of clarity and confidence,” Chris Drake, the men’s team head coach, said of his team’s match against the Red Storm. However, Drake noted that his team “did a better job of committing to its games [and] trying to play with conviction regardless of circumstance or situation” against the Terriers.
Drake was particularly proud of captain Arnav Dhingra ’22, who “battled injuries throughout the year” but still competed in both the singles and doubles events.
Dhingra shared his excitement about being “back out on the court for the first time this season,” and shared that “there is no feeling like being out there with your teammates.”
Although the men faced a tough loss on Saturday, Walker Oberg ’25 was proud of his team bouncing back and dominating the Sunday competition.
Michael Sun ’23 and Dhingra led the Saturday doubles line-up, followed by Aidan Reilly ’25 with Theo Dean ’24 and Luke Neal ’25 with Renaud Lefevre ’24. Sun also played the top line of singles, ahead of Dean, Reilly, Oberg, Shervin Dehmoubed ’25, and Neal. On Sunday, Cody Lin ’22 and Sun played the first line of doubles, followed by Neal with Lefevre and Daniel Gale ’23 with Dhingra. Reilly took on the top line of singles, ahead of Dehmoubed, Oberg, Neal, Lefevre and Dhingra.
Meanwhile, the women’s team faced off against other Ancient Eight teams at the ECAC Indoor Championships. The Bulldogs opened their weekend with a 2–4 loss to Columbia on Friday, followed by a 4–2 victory against Cornell on Saturday and a 1–4 loss to Brown on Sunday.
“I thought we competed well, and we played really well in doubles,” said Rachel Kahan, the women’s team head coach.
According to Kahan, the tournament was a great opportunity to see how her squad compares to the other teams in the Ivy League before regular league matches begin. The team’s first conference match will be against Brown on April 2 at the Cullman-Heyman Tennis Center.
Kathy Wang ’22 echoed Kahan’s sentiments. Her personal highlight of the weekend “was coming back in doubles from 2–5 down against Columbia” with her doubles partner Caroline Dunleavy ’22. Wang also shared praise for her teammates, believing that they “did a great job of fighting in every match and keeping [their] energy high.”
The women’s team held the same line-up for the entire weekend. Chelsea Kung ’23 and Jessie Gong ’22 played the first line of doubles, followed by Dunleavy with Wang and Vivian Cheng ’23 with Jamie Kim ’25. Kung also led the team in singles, ahead of Dunleavy, Gong, Rhea Shrivastava ’23, Cheng and Wang.
This weekend, the men’s team will journey to Ithaca, New York for the ECAC Championships. The women’s team will travel to New Jersey to take on Rutgers University on Saturday.