W. Tennis coasts past Yale, Brown

Anxious. Pressing. Frustration. These words all described the Penn women tennis team's emotions after dropping its first four Ivy League matches by close margins. But the Quakers breathed a collective sigh of relief after notching two conference wins this weekend. Penn hosted Brown in the opening match of its second consecutive Ivy weekend. The Quakers promptly trounced the Bears 6-1. This victory was important for two reasons. First, senior co-captain Leanne Mos was able to end her nagging losing streak, although she was forced into a final set that ended in a tie-breaker. Second, Penn did something it had failed to do all year -- it won its close matches. During its winless streak in the Ancient Eight, Penn (12-4, 2-4 Ivy League) had become notorious for putting up a fight, but then failing to come out with a victory. This all changed against Brown (5-12, 0-5), when three Quakers were taken into a final set. Yet this time, everyone came away with a win. This was best exemplified by sophomore No. 6 singles player Beth Brady. She dropped her initial set 6-1, but regrouped to only lose five games the rest of the way, as she rolled 6-3, 6-2. If a 6-1 victory could ever be considered dull, it could when compared to the match against Yale (5-7, 2-2) Saturday. The Quakers defeated the Elis 4-3 in a contest that contained a spectacular match at first doubles. Bernstein and sophomore Preety Sorathia paired up to participate in a match that was deemed by Penn coach Cissie Leary as being one the greatest collegiate matches ever. Bernstein and Sorathia were down 7-5, but fought back to force a tie-breaker. The winner of the tie-breaker would also be the winner of the doubles point because Mos and senior co-captain Suejin Kim had already won at No. 2 doubles. With each team hitting flawless shots, Penn still managed to get three match points, but failed each time to get the victory. The final score of the tie-breaker ended up 15-13, with the Quakers on the short end. A sense of deja vu had happened. Penn played a hard-fought match, only to lose. This defeat presented the Quakers with an excuse to give up, but the opposite happened. Penn collected itself to win four of the six singles matches. This was all the more impressive because Bernstein and Sorathia both won after coming off of their two-hour marathon match. "I hadn't stopped thinking about the doubles match as I entered the singles," Bernstein said. "But also, the doubles match calmed me down a little. So in the singles, I played my game, and didn't let her dictate the match. I was in control." It was relieving for the Quakers to finally come out ahead on the score sheet. In a season that had previously been consumed with near misses, a "W" was welcome. "It was so good, especially since Yale had beaten Princeton," Leary said. "They brought everyone and came at us with full strength. We're a good team, but we just needed to show everybody else that we are a good team."