The women's tennis team saw its five-match winning streak end Friday afternoon at the hands of undefeated Bowdoin, which pushed its record to 13-0 with the win.
The No. 20 Jumbos were hoping to upset the No. 7 Polar Bears on their trip to Brunswick, Maine, where a road victory would have given them some momentum going into another tough match against No. 4 Amherst tomorrow.
Unfortunately for the Jumbos, a win was not in the cards, as the women suffered three doubles losses and four additional singles losses to the Polar Bears, giving Bowdoin the 7-2 win.
"I think we all tried to do too much in either the doubles or the singles," senior tri-captain Kylyn Deary said. "After this match we realized that we are up there with the top teams and all we have to do is play our game."
After emphasizing doubles play in practice last week, Tufts was hoping to win two out of three doubles matches to seize the advantage going into singles play. The Polar Bears' unique style of one-up, one-back doubles proved to be too much for the Jumbos, and all three Jumbos pairs dropped their matches.
"It was very disappointing," senior tri-captain Jen Luten said. "Our doubles that I know didn't show up at the match. It would have been a very interesting match if we had won at least one of the doubles matches."
In the No. 1 spot, Luten and Deary faced off against the Bowdoin duo of junior Kristen Raymond and sophomore Sarah D'Elia, the pair currently at the top of the Northeast rankings. Though Luten and Deary put up a fight, they ended up falling 8-3.
At No. 2, junior Andrea Cenko and freshman Meghan McCooey lost to the Bowdoin pair of seniors Kelsey Hughes and Christine D'Elia by the same 8-3 score. In the closest doubles match of the day, sophomore Mari Homma and freshman Erica Miller fell to the Polar Bear pair of freshman Brett Davis and sophomore Rachel Waldman by a score of 8-5.
"Doubles was definitely the downside of the match," Luten said. "We have worked so hard on doubles and it didn't shine through."
"Losing all three doubles definately affected our singles play," Deary said. "If we would have pulled out one of the doubles points I think our moral going into singles would have been more positive."
After being swept in doubles play, the Jumbos needed a total of five out of six singles wins to take the match. Luten and McCooey did their parts by turning in two wins: Luten was awarded a victory by default over Sarah D'Elia, who forfeited due to illness, and McCooey edged Raymond 6-2, 6-4.
"Singles was very very close," Luten said. "We are a great team with lots of talent, I think that what our team lacks is that confidence and knowing that we are good. It shows up when everyone had close matches all the way through the lineup. Being down 3-0 and then realizing that you are right there in the singles shows that we are a strong team. We just need to believe in ourselves."
Those two singles wins were the Jumbos' only victories. Although each of the four matches was close, the Polar Bears came out on top in the No. 3 through No. 6 spots.
In the No. 3 spot, Cenko fell to Hughes in the first set 2-6 before coming back to win the second set 6-2. With the match tied at one set apiece, Hughes pulled away in the third set, turning in a 6-1 win and the first singles win for the Polar Bears.
The bottom of the lineup suffered tough defeats once again for the Jumbos, as No. 4 senior Silvia Schmid lost in two close sets, dropping the second in a tiebreaker; Homma went three sets in her loss in the No. 6 spot.
"The highlight of the match was definitely singles matches," Luten said. "Erica, Mari, and Silvia left it all out on the court. McCooey played awesome against a tough competitor."
"The downside was losing all three doubles that negatively affected the rest of the match," Deary said. "But the highlight was knowing that we are up there, ready to compete with the best teams in the nation. Also, Meghan had a great win; she played with confidence and patience."
The women must put the loss behind them if they want to compete with No. 4 Amherst, which visits Tufts tomorrow.
"I think that we have all the stuff there," Luten said. "We need to work on our mental game. We need to play our game and be confident. The NESCAC teams are tough, but we have a great team; we don't need to do anything special."
