Every match is crucial now for the tennis teams, whose Ivy League seasons include only seven contests. Both the men's and women's teams held under the pressure this weekend, winning their respective league openers against Penn.
For the women's team — which anticipated Penn as one of its toughest rivals for the league title — doubles made all the difference. Senior Amanda Hastings-Phillips, junior Gailor Large and freshman Kavitha Krishnamurthy won their singles matches to put Princeton (10-2 overall, 1-0 Ivy League) ahead, 3-2. Sophomore Kristi Watson then dropped a three-set heartbreaker (4-6, 6-1, 7-6) to put the match in the hands of the doubles teams.
The Tigers' doubles squad — which swept the remaining three matches — proved to be more than competent, clinching the win and starting the Tigers off 1-0 in their quest for an Ivy championship.
Nerves were not a factor for Hastings-Phillips and Large, who won their doubles match, 8-3.
No stage fright
"We didn't have time to be nervous," Hastings-Phillips said. "We had high energy. We've been working on doubles a lot and we're really confident."
The No. 2 doubles team of Watson and senior Jyotsna Vasisht and the No. 3 doubles team of Krishnamurthy and sophomore Priya Bhupathi both worked to give Princeton crucial doubles points.
In singles play, Krishnamurthy eased through her match (6-4, 6-2) while Hastings-Phillips and Large had one tough set each.
Hastings-Phillips' difficult set in her singles contest was her first one. The senior's Quaker opponent — who beat her in three sets at the Princeton Invitational earlier this year — took her to 7-5 before losing. Hastings-Phillips then closed the match out with a decisive 6-1 win in the second set.
"I knew I could beat her because she's better indoors," Hastings-Phillips said, "and since we played outside, that worked to my advantage."
Large had an easy time of it in the first set, coasting at 6-1. But the second set went into a tiebreaker — during which Large's opponent had several set points before Large was able to finish the set, 7-6.
"All the Ivies are really good," Hastings-Phillips said. "But Penn and Harvard are the toughest."
With this weekend's win against Penn and their fall win over Harvard, things look good for the Princeton women as they look forward to further Ivy League competition this weekend against Yale and Brown.
Turning point
The doubles matches were also crucial for the Tiger men as they got off to a solid start and easily took care of their Penn opponents — despite the disadvantage of playing away and on faster courts — with a 5-2 victory.
The No. 1 doubles team of seniors Ahn Ahn Liu and Scott Borenstein got things started with an 8-6 win, which the other two teams mirrored.
Despite the close numbers, the Tiger players never felt there was any danger of Penn's being able to break serve.
"It wasn't quite that close," senior Scott Borenstein said. "We were definitely better than the team we were playing. It was important to win because we knew all the singles matches would be close."
Although each of the singles matches included lengthy sets, Princeton won four of the six due to the efforts of Liu, juniors Kyle Kliegerman and John Portlock and freshman Trevor Smith.
"It's difficult when the players are used to the way a certain court plays," head coach David Benjamin said. "That's why there is such a huge home court advantage."
The Tigers pulled off this win despite injuries to several sophomores on the roster. Judson Williams played despite a hurt arm, Darren Joe was forced to retire after splitting the first two sets because of a pulled muscle and Nick Benjamin was also unable to play due to an arm injury.
"Given all that, we did well," coach Benjamin said. "All teams need to be lucky as far as injuries go, but in tennis a little more so. You can't sub for a player mid-match.
"Our biggest agenda item is definitely to get everyone healthy."
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