W. Tennis has mixed results at ECACs

Coming off a heart-breaking loss to Penn State two weeks ago, the Penn women's tennis team went into the ECAC tournament last weekend with the intent of showing that they belonged among the Eastern elite. With Ivy League powers of Brown, Harvard and Princeton in attendance, the Quakers had the opportunity to establish themselves as the team to beat this spring. But the results were mixed. The level of talent at the tournament made seeds practically meaningless, and the results showed. Of the nine individual tournaments held, only four played out as expected, and in only one did the top two seeds make the finals. For Penn, nothing went exactly as planned. While every Quaker held her own in her respective tournament, few shined. Freshman Anastasia Pozdniakova, playing in the top singles tournament, suffered a disappointing loss to Brown's Trisna Patel in the first round, rebounded sharply with a win over top seed Ivy Wang of Harvard, only to fall in a close match in the finals of the losers bracket, 3-6, 7-6, 7-6. The rest of the team didn't fair much better. Sophomore Brooke Herman, playing in the "B" singles tournament, also lost her first match, but was able to take the losers bracket by winning her next two matches, 6-3, 6-2 and 6-3, 4-6, 6-1. Penn co-captain Lara Afanassiev, the No. 2 seed in the "C" singles tournament, was upset in the first round by West Virginia's Meghan Cornwall, but followed Herman's example by finding her rhythm in the next two matches. She won the first by default when her opponent retired with Afanassiev holding a 4-3 lead in the first set, and she took the second in a close battle with Princeton's Olivia Streatfield, 7-5, 7-5. After sophomore Karen Ridley took the losers bracket of the "D" singles tournament, sophomore Julia Feldman and junior co-captain Andi Grossman finally landed some first-round wins. Feldman, playing in the "E" singles tournament, defeated Rutger's Angelique Matuch, but fell in a close second-round match to the No. 2 seed, Harvard's Vedica Jain, 6-7, 7-5, 6-3. Grossman, playing in the "F" singles tournament, had even more success. Not only did she take her first-round match by manhandling the No. 2 seed, Brown's Kirsten Odabashian, 6-2, 6-2, but she also battled her way to the finals with a victory over West Virginia's Karin Flaig. There she ran into a brick wall in the form of Princeton's Amanda Hastings-Phillips, losing, 6-0, 6-1. "As a team, we were disappointed," Grossman said. "We know we should have done a lot better." In doubles play, the Quakers fared no better. None of the three pairs that Penn sent out on the court made it past the first round, but the duo of Afanassiev and Feldman did take the loser's bracket in the "A" doubles tournament by winning their final two matches over Princeton, 8-6, and West Virginia, 8-5. The results show that the Quakers are still a ways from their main goal: Ivy dominance. The strong showings of Brown and Princeton, in particular, gave notice to the Penn team that nothing will be handed to them this spring. On the other hand, Pozdniakova's win over Harvard sensation Ivy Wang, coupled with several impressive wins in the tournaments, is nothing to frown upon. Overall, however, the Quakers know that what they showed over the weekend will not be enough. "We have to step it up," Grossman said.