Over the weekend, five members from both the women’s and men’s squash teams competed in the CSA Individual Championships at Amherst. Both the women’s and men’s squash teams' No. 1 players — junior Julie Cerullo, who entered the tournament ranked No. 5, and junior Todd Harrity, the returning individual champion from last year — fell in the semifinals round, ending the squash season outright.
Days after appearing in the “Faces in the Crowd” section of Sports Illustrated, Harrity fought his way to the semifinals by beating his fellow teammates in the second and third rounds of the tournament. In the semifinals, Harrity got a second chance at his opponent Ramit Tandon from Columbia, who had defeated him in the regular season 3-0. The results this time were similar, as Tandon took the three games 11-7, 11-5 and 11-6.
Tandon came into the tournament ranked as the second seed, while Harrity was the third. Playing against a better opponent emphasized to Harrity what he could do to improve.
“Even though he beat me, it was a pretty close, competitive match,” Harrity said. “It exposed to me areas of my game that need to improve, like my attacking game and being more deceptive. I took a lot away from that match.”
On the women’s side, both the No. 1 and 2 advanced from the first round of play. After winning her first match in three sets, sophomore Libby Eyre was pushed to five games in her second match, winning an extremely close 11-9 game in the fifth to advance to the quarterfinals.
Cerullo’s run in the tournament included several manageable matches, as she won in four games or less until her semi-final match. On her way to the semi-finals, Cerullo defeated down Harvard’s Cecelia Cortes who had upset two higher-seeded opponents, including Trinity’s Catalina Peleaz, who entered the tournament ranked No. 4. Cerullo took down her opponent in three quick games.
“I went into the tournament as a 5th seed, so I was happy to have exceeded what was expected of me,” Cerullo said.
Making it to the semi-finals meant that Cerullo ended up in the top four of the nation, which improved her individual ranking from last year.
Although the men also performed considerably well, with three of them making it to at least the quarterfinals, the men’s draw included several matchups that pitted Princeton players against their teammates.
“It was sort of a strange weekend for me because I had to play teammates, which I didn’t really enjoy,” Harrity said. “It’s hard to play a teammate because you’re friends. It’s just not really a fun match.”
The matchups between teammates occurred in the round of 16 and the quarterfinals, in which Harrity, who played as No. 1 for Princeton during the season, competed against freshman No. 3 Tyler Osbourne and senior No. 4 Kelly Shannon.
Overall, though, the men performed well, with four of them advancing to the second round of play. In his first match, freshman Samuel Kang upset Christopher Hanson from Dartmouth in a demanding five-game match. After dropping the first two games, it looked as if Hanson was going to take the match, but Kang turned it around in the third, winning 13-11 and going on to win the following two games to clinch the match.
Shannon, who won the deciding match against Trinity two weeks ago to win the National Team Championship, started the tournament strongly by knocking out last year’s individual finalist, Nick Sachvie from Cornell, in just three games. Shannon continued his run by upsetting Rochester’s Benjamin Fischer in the second round, securing his place in the quarterfinals, where he ran into Harrity.
On the other hand, senior Chris Callis, who also went into five games in his first match, experienced a less favorable result. Although Callis took the first two games, his match ended less favorably and participated in the Consolation Round. However, Callis proceeded to play well in the backdraw and ultimately emerged as the winner, defeating his opponent in the finals in just three games.
Although this year’s squash season finally came to a close, the Tigers don’t expect to take much of a break.
“I am going to take some time off, but we have offseason training,” Harrity said. “After spring break, we regroup and get back to training hard.”
For now though, the Tigers can look back and be proud of what they’ve accomplished this season.
“I look forward with interacting with my team off the court,” Cerullo said.
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