While many students deserted campus for the weekend, the Penn women's tennis team was home in full force at the eighth annual Cissie Leary Invitational.
For three grueling days, the Lott Tennis Courts were packed with over 50 singles players and 25 doubles teams from nine different schools. These teams included Ivy League rivals Columbia, Harvard and Princeton as well as much larger schools such as Arizona, Maryland and Penn State.
Although the regular season for the Red and Blue is still six months away, Penn coach Michael Dowd believes the tournament is both useful and needed.
"The main point of the tournament is to play matches and play good, hard tennis out of respect for Cissie Leary, a great tennis coach of 20 years," Dowd said.
The tournament helps returning players refine their skills and allows newcomers to get a taste of what Division I tennis is all about.
If this tournament is any barometer of the regular season, Penn should find itself in the familiar position of fighting for the top spot in the Ancient Eight. Dowd was very impressed with what he saw.
"I hope this is an indication of the season to come. We have a lot of depth. We are looking strong," he said.
The Quakers comprised three of the four players in the singles semifinals.
Penn's Yulia Rivelis faced off against top-seeded Ramona But of Maryland. While the score was lopsided in favor of But, 6-0, 6-2, the play and exchanges were not. Rivelis' downfall was her penchant for unforced errors. They not only played a role on the court, but more importantly, the errors took their toll mentally and Rivelis was never able to recover from her early mistakes.
The singles finals match was impressive before it even started. The two best players to emerge from the field of 51 were But and Penn freshman Julia Koulbitskaya, who was playing in her first collegiate appearance.
"Win or lose, it's an amazing showing," Dowd said of his freshman player.
Koulbitskaya fell short in making her Cinderella story a reality, losing to But, 6-3, 6-1.
While Penn had a respectable showing in the singles bracket, doubles were a different story. Penn's doubles teams were all eliminated before the semifinal matches, with the exception of Michelle Mitchell and Koulbitskaya. But their hopes were ultimately snuffed out by Harvard, which won the eight-game, single-set match, 8-6. The Crimson continued into the finals, where they took on Maryland. In the doubles finals, But and teammate Marriane Baker delivered a crushing victory over Harvard, 8-2.
Dowd expressed disappointment about the doubles performances, but said it is only natural for new teams to struggle in the beginning of the year.
"We lost a lot of our best doubles players last year," Dowd said. "Now we need to focus on doubles work. We need to work out the new teams and new pairings to see what works best."
The Quakers will have another opportunity to fine-tune the doubles teams and continue to build upon the momentum from this weekend at the ITA All-American Invite next weekend in Pacific Palisades, Calif.
