Tennis: Women move closer to Ivy League title with pair of home victories

Sophomore Hilary Bartlett, ranked the No. 72 singles player by the Intercollegiate Tennis Association, continued her stellar play this weekend. On Friday, she upset Harvard’s best player, No. 56 Holly Cao, in convincing fashion, beating her 6-1, 6-3.

“I had actually played her earlier in the season when we lost to Dartmouth in the [Eastern College Athletic Conference] Championships,” Bartlett said. “She beat me pretty handily, so I knew going in I had absolutely nothing to lose. No one was expecting me to win, and when you go into a match with a free mindset, it’s easier to play better tennis.”

Sophomore Rachel Saiontz, junior Blakely Ashley and freshman Monica Chow also contributed to the Tigers’ victory over Harvard by winning their singles matches.

The following day, Princeton topped Dartmouth to become the sole undefeated team left in the Ivy League. Besides Bartlett, Ashley and Chow, junior Taylor Marable and senior Melissa Saiontz won their singles matches.

Princeton’s 5-0 start in the Ivy League is its best since 2000.

“The difference between this year and last year is the intangibles,” Bartlett said. “We really believe we can beat these teams. When we beat Vanderbilt and Marshall — they were two pretty highly ranked teams at the time — it allowed us to believe we could actually be playing with the top teams in the country. So when we approached the Ivy League season with every Ivy team ranked lower than us, we believed we deserved the ranking we had.”

The Tigers travel to Ithaca, N.Y., on Friday in a key matchup against Cornell before hosting Columbia at home on Sunday. A win over Cornell will guarantee at least a shared title of the Ivy League.

“Our coach, Megan [Bradley], has really stressed throughout Ivy League play that we’re approaching each match in exactly the same way,” Bartlett said. “We don’t focus on the other school in practice, and to us, Cornell is just match six out of seven.”

The men’s team (8-11, 4-1) fell to Harvard (11-10, 2-2) 5-2 in Cambridge, Mass., on Friday, ending its undefeated run in the conference. Freshmen Matija Pecotic and Matt Siow were the sole winners in singles.

The following day, Princeton rebounded to beat Dartmouth (10-9, 1-3) 4-3 in dramatic come-from-behind fashion.

With only two matches still on court, the Tigers found themselves down 3-2 to the Big Green and in need of victories from both junior Alex Faust and sophomore Coleman Crutchfield.

Victory over Dartmouth seemed unlikely when Faust found himself down a set and two breaks against Xander Centenari. Yet Faust was able to fight back to take the second set 6-4. The third set did not start off well for Princeton, as Faust was down 5-3 and only two points away from losing. But Faust held serve to extend the match. A crucial overrule on the first point came with Centenari serving for the match at 5-4, giving Faust a slight edge. At 30-40, the most crucial point of the match, the loud Dartmouth crowd went silent as Faust put away a backhand volley into the open court to even the match at 5-5.

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Meanwhile, Crutchfield was also battling Jeff Friedman to keep Princeton’s chances alive. Crutchfield won the first set 7-6. At 5-5 in the second, the match was suspended due to darkness and moved indoors.

After moving indoors, Faust won all eight points he played to win the third set 7-5 and even the team score with Dartmouth at 3-3.

“My mentality was to try and stay out there as long as possible, since we had other matches going on at the same time,” Faust said. “It was getting really close. A lot of us on the team were feeling really desperate at the time, and it wasn’t looking good. I tried to scrap for points and hang on as long as I could. Points started going more my way, and I got a little bit of momentum, which helped me carry through the set.”

Crutchfield held serve at love to go up 6-5. In the next game, on his third match point, Friedman’s ball sailed long, securing the Tigers’ victory as the team stormed the court to celebrate.

The men’s team hopes to carry this momentous win into next week, when it hosts Cornell on Friday and travels to Columbia on Sunday.

“It was a great win for us — really exciting,” Faust said. “At the same time, we understand there’s still a lot of work to be done. These two teams [Cornell and Columbia] could potentially be the toughest two of the Ivy League season, so we have our work cut out for us. We hope to carry the momentum into practice and our matches and to come out this weekend fired up and ready to play.”