Wednesday night at Ringe Courts played out more like a Disney movie than a squash match. And as they seem to do only in the movies, the underdog Quakers pulled out a seemingly miraculous 5-4 comeback win over undefeated No. 1 Princeton.
It was a perfect setup: a heated rivalry pitting two undefeated squads against each other, a coach looking for his first win over his alma mater and an underdog looking to avenge last year's loss .
The match began in a manner befitting the cirumstances. The Tigers had not lost a flight all season, and they looked like they would continue their streak as they won all three in the first cycle.
Soon after, junior Emily Goodwin fell 3-0 and the Quakers found themselves only one more lost flight from conceding their fifth straight loss to Princeton.
Even at the darkest of times, coach Jack Wyant remained confident.
"They started out really fast, but I felt like we might still be in it," he said. "I thought we might be able to eke out some matches, make it interesting."
Then, point by point and game by game, the Quakers began to crawl back into it. Junior Alisha Turner and sophomore Britt Hebden won their matches 3-0, but sophomore Kristen Lange, freshman Anne Madeira and junior Tara Chawla all still needed wins for Penn to emerge victorious.
After Lange and Madeira each downed their opponents 2-1, all eyes turned to the tiebreaking game between Chawla and Princeton's Emery Maine.
Maine jumped out to a 1-0 lead, but it was all Chawla after that. She soon held an 8-1 lead, flashed a confident smile to the fans and shortly after iced a 9-3 victory. Her teammates rushed the court to mob her, singing a chorus of "Happy Birthday" in honor of the her 21st birthday.
The team continued to credit chemistry and unity as the reason for its successes. Senior co-captain Lauralynn Drury was quick to point out how important it was to keep Chawla motivated on the court in that final game.
"I think a big reason why she pulled that match off was because she had twelve other girls screaming their heads off for her," Drury said.
Thanks to Chawla's focus and her team's support, the Quakers (8-0, 4-0 Ivy) will likely rise to No. 1 in the nation, as they and Harvard are the only remaining unbeaten elite teams.
They will look to change that, too, as they face the Crimson in ten days.
The win marks a step forward for the program, which has continually been hunting to crack into the elite tier of squash schools since Wyant's arrival. Now, having beaten Harvard, Yale, Princeton and Trinity in the past two years, Penn may find itself with a target on its back as well.
That's just fine with the team, though.
"[Being No.1] is just more motivation, because it shows that all our hard work pays off," Elizabeth Kern said. "We can constantly look back at this match and say this is why we work so hard."
The hard work and team unity could carry the team even further, even to its first Ivy League championship since 2000 and a potential rematch with Princeton in the Howe Cup finals.
Get Walt Disney on the phone; a sequel could be in the works.
