M. Squash splits weekend matches with new lineup

Sam Miller had been waiting four years for this moment. "That was the most exciting match I have ever seen, played in, whatever, what have you, in my entire collegiate squash career, without a doubt," said Miller, Penn's senior co-captain. After nearly four hours of squash, during which half the matches stretched the full five games, the No. 8 Penn men's squash team emerged victorious over No. 7 Dartmouth by a 5-4 margin. Miller brought his Red and Blue career to a close with a 9-2, 6-9, 9-1, 9-4 victory over Jesse Nisselson. "Today was a culmination of four years of hard work," Penn coach Craig Thorpe-Clarke said. "This was one of the better moments for us" in team history, he added. A sweep of the top three spots on the ladder punctuated the win, a reversal from the team's past victories, in which the lower-ranked players won the bulk of the matches. "That's a testament to how much we wanted it," Miller said. For this match and Saturday's 7-2 loss to No. 3 Harvard, Thorpe-Clarke pulled a mild surprise by placing freshman Jacob Himmelrich at No. 2 and inserting Colby Emerson at No. 4, a reversal of their spots in previous matches. "He's ready to play," Thorpe-Clarke said of the freshman, who defeated Miller and Emerson in a midweek challenge match series. The results "were all pretty close, and that's how [they] ended up," Thorpe-Clarke said. Himmelrich proved he deserved the spot yesterday, defeating Andrei Prokopiw, 9-0, 9-5, 2-9, 9-0. "I came out and I was hitting the ball well and going short well, and I just kept on attacking," the freshman said. "It's definitely a great feeling to win today like that." "Jacob played a dream match," Thorpe-Clarke said. "You can't ask for anyone to play as well as he played." The match of the day was the clash of the schools' top players, as Penn No. 1 and nationally ranked No. 12 Richard Repetto took on Dartmouth's top man, No. 8 Ryan Donegan. As Repetto took the court, Penn needed only one more win to clinch a victory on the day. He fell behind 1-9, 9-1, 9-10. At the same time, Emerson was down two games, and senior co-captain Elan Levy was about to surrender a two-games-to-one lead to William Hiltz in the No. 6 slot. The chances of a Penn victory were quickly decreasing. But spurred on by a raucous crowd in the bleachers behind the Molloy Exhibition Court, Repetto rallied to take the final two games, 9-5, 9-3, and clinch the win for the Red and Blue. "That was a huge match for me to win," Repetto said. "I thought my match was going to be the icing on the cake" instead of the clinching victory he added. "Rich is a very talented player, and he's worked hard the last few weeks to make this happen for him," Miller said. "But man, I was scared," Repetto let on.