Women's tennis has multiple strong performers at Cissie Leary Invitational

Traveling to nearby Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the Princeton women’s tennis team competed in just their second event this year, following up last week’s Princeton Invitational with an appearance at the Cissie Leary Invitational.

On Friday, the Tigers came in hoping to build off an extremely impressive performance from last weekend, where they took 11 out of 14 doubles matches and 16 of their 19 singles matches. Princeton sent eight competitors to the “A” draw of singles portion of the event, an elimination-style tournament bracket with 32 competitors. Of the eight Tigers in the bracket, seven of them — senior Emily Hahn, junior Sivan Krems, junior Alanna Wolff and sophomore Katrine Steffensen in the “A” draw, junior Caroline Joyce, sophomore Sara Goodwin, freshman Amber Parkand freshman Nicole Kalhorn in “B” — advanced onto the next round, each of them winning in two sets, as Park would fall in three.

The field for doubles was split into “A” doubles and “B” doubles. Steffensen and junior Dorothy Tang formed one team for the Tigers’ A doubles, and Hahn and Park formed another. In this field of 16, Hahn and Park fell in the first round. Steffensen and Tang made their way to the semifinals, but would go no further.

This feat is made all the more impressive by the fact that Tang was and currently is dealing with a bout of tendonitis in her left wrist, and had to adjust her game accordingly.

“My wrist hurts every time I hit a backhand, but I play on the backhand side in doubles. Instead of hitting my backhand, I’d have to slice it, and slice it up.” Tang explained.

“In the beginning rounds, it wasn’t too tough. But as we got deeper into the tournament, we played tougher teams, who hit harder and bigger.” Tang said. “It kind of got into my head that my backhand was kind of affecting my play because I felt kind of hindered by it. Overall, it was mostly about strategy and being able to compensate for my backhand and getting into better position for my forehand.”

For the “B” doubles, while the team of Krems and Wolff was stopped short in the quarterfinal round, Goodwin and Kalhorn won three matches to advance to the final round of their draw.

On the second day, Steffensen was the only Tiger in the “A” draw to move onto the semifinals, winning both her matches while all three of her teammates in the draw fell in their first match of the day. The “B” Draw saw much more success, as Kalhorn and Joyce moved on to compete in the semifinal round on Sunday.

Kalhorn did not see as much success in her doubles match, falling along with Goodwin to come just short of winning the "B" draw.

The Tigers would not be able to take home any first place appearances for the weekend. Steffensen won her semifinal round in 2 sets but fell in the same number in the final round. For “B” singles, both Kalhorn and Joyce fell in three sets each in the semifinal round.

The team returns to action Oct. 9, for the Navy Blue & Gold Invitational in Annapolis, Md.