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Women's Squash split weekend against Harvard and Dartmouth, Men's lose Ivy doubleheader

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After a thrilling victory against Penn on Wednesday, Jan. 31, the men’s squash team looked to defeat Harvard and Dartmouth to continue the same momentum during their weekend road trip through New England. The Tigers, however, faced tough losses on Saturday and Sunday, finishing 9-0 against the Crimson and 5-4 against the Big Green.

The women’s team also defeated Penn before facing Harvard and Dartmouth, succumbing 8-1 to the Crimson but beating the Big Green at 9-0 to conclude the weekend.

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The two-match weekend began at the Murr Center squash courts in Boston for the men. The team hoped to stack up another win, but the Ivy League champions controlled the match from start to finish, clinching a 9-0 victory.

Though Harvard triumphantly walked off the courts with a considerable margin of victory, the match wasn’t without honorable individual performances. Harvard sophomore and reigning Ivy League Rookie of the Year Saadeldin Abouaish faced off against Princeton first-year Youssef Ibrahim in a highly contested match. The back-and-forth competition resulted in close scores of 11-8, 10-12, 11-6, 6-11, and 11-8, with Abouaish securing the win. First-year Duncan Joyce and Alex Engstrom also boasted individual wins, while junior Cody Cortes competed in two close games against Harvard’s Madhav Dhingra.

Though Saturday’s match dampened Princeton’s spirits heading into Sunday, the seventh-ranked team mustered enough energy to contend in a thrilling match against fifth-ranked Dartmouth. Joyce, Ibrahim, and junior Clark Doyle each won their respective matches to garner three points for the Orange and Black. Lagging behind the Big Green at 4-3, first-year Cole Becker equalized the match at 4-4 with a victory at the third position. Dartmouth, however, took the lead after Jack Harvey defeated Engstrom to finish off the match, a third consecutive win over Princeton.


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After the weekend matches, Princeton currently sits at 3-2 in the Ivy League conference and 8-3 overall.

Looking ahead, the men’s team will compete against first-ranked Columbia on Friday in New York City and Cornell on Sunday in the Jadwin Gymnasium to wrap up Ivy League play.

Though they were defeated by Harvard in Saturday’s match, the women’s squash team claimed an impressive victory against Dartmouth on Sunday.

The team headed into the set of weekend matches with an exciting 6-3 win over Penn, but the reigning Howe Cup champions overtook the Tigers to finish at 8-1.

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All-American senior Olivia Fiechter picked up the individual win for Princeton, defeating former Ivy League Player of the Year Sabrina Sobhy with 14-12, 11-9, and 11-8 final tallies. First-year Raneem El Torky, junior Samantha Chai, and sophomore Madison Soukup also won individual games in their respective matches, but Harvard proved to be the stronger opponent, taking the match at 8-1.

The Tigers bounced back on Sunday with a stunning 9-0 victory over the Big Green with notable performances from Fiechter and junior Kate Feeley. While Fiechter followed up on her exceptional win the day before with a win over Dartmouth’s Anne Blasberg, Feeley returned from an injury to claim an individual victory at the eighth position.

To round off the final score at 9-0, El Torky, Chai, Soukup, junior Isabel Hirshberg, and first-years Grace Doyle, Emma Leonard, Mia Rosini also picked up individual victories in their respective matches.

The Tigers now stand at 4-1 in the conference and 11-1 on the season, with Harvard responsible for their only loss in conference and regular season play.

The women’s team will also face Columbia on Friday and Cornell on Sunday to complete Ivy League play before heading into the Howe Cup Championships.