W. Squash meets two Ivy foes

Although squash is currently out of season, the Penn women's squash team hopes to reap a fertile harvest as it travels to New England this weekend to take on Ivy League foes Yale and Brown. For the Quakers, who have only five Ancient Eight games on their schedule this year, this first weekend of the season could also prove to be the most crucial. Penn will take on Yale in New Haven tomorrow and Brown in Providence on Sunday. "This is going to be a very significant trip for us," Quakers coach Demer Holleran said. "We have 40 percent of our Ivy schedule in one weekend." After crushing Franklin & Marshall 9-0 on Tuesday, the team appears to be in full swing despite the youth seen on the roster. The Elis and the Bears, however, are both much stronger teams than the Diplomats. "[The Franklin & Marshall contest] was a nice confidence boost, but they really didn't present much of a challenge," Holleran said. Yale is expected to be the better of this weekend's opponents, having edged out Penn in the first scrimmage of the preseason. "We feel that we're a stronger, more experienced team this time around, and Yale's a little weaker," Holleran said. "We played them in our first scrimmage," said Penn's Lindsay Moss, who will be playing in the No. 4 spot this weekend. "Most of our team was new to varsity, and everyone was nervous, so we didn't play as well as we could have." Penn defeated Brown decisively in the preseason and hopes to do so again on Sunday. Holleran knows, however, that the Bears should be more competitive this time. "We don't want to take Brown too lightly because we just beat them 5-4 last year," Holleran said. Penn's top three of Jessica DiMauro, Katie Patrick and Dana Lipson will be playing for the first time this year in the Yale game. All three sat out their matches against Franklin & Marshall in order to maintain eligibility for next month's Constable Invitational. Their presence could prove to be the difference against Yale and Brown. "We are very strong in the top part of our lineup," Holleran said. "We should definitely win our matches in the top three, and, if we do, we only need to win two more matches."