NESCACs Looming for Women's Tennis

Author: Dan Shea

While its male counterparts trekked to Maine, the Middlebury women's tennis team made the time-honored Grand Tour of Southern New England this past weekend, making stops at Amherst College and Connecticut College. The group called upon Amherst as their first destination. Foregoing the typical Berkshire pleasures of mountain-gazing and pretentious music festivals, they played a tough game against America's number three-ranked team, losing 7-2.
Before the match got underway, though, the more didactic side that every Grand Tour features foisted itself upon the women, as rainy skies taught them a lesson in New England meteorology. Forced to wait out an hour-long delay, the two sets of opponents took to the outdoor courts a touch late. Once there, junior Co-captain Jena Siegel had no fear in facing the ballyhooed Lord Jeffs: "We played them as if they were anybody else. We made our competitors faceless. We simply paid attention to their strokes." Though she didn't harden her heart quite so much as to make her competitors faceless, Co-captain Sandy Spring '04 also steeled her nerve, recognizing that "[Amherst players are] all human; they're all vulnerable."
Finding some time in its Tour to rewrite Homer, the Middlebury party looked not to Apollo but to Aeolus and his wind in finding the Lord Jeffs' Achilles' heels. Spring recalled that the blustery day made for "scrappy play. Each game was more up for grabs than usual," she said. From the Middlebury side, it was Kristin Baker '04.5 who made the first grab, which the number-six Panther did in a 6-2, 4-6, 7-5 victory over Amherst's Erin Murphy. In doing so, Baker replicated the success of her Middlebury Invitational final round showing last week.
Baker was not alone in her upset: the number-two doubles team of Siegel and Nina Popel '04 worked the gusts to their advantage and unseated Amherst's Kristen Raverta and Hadley Miller with an 8-4 score. Siegel and Popel's win was enough to earn the twosome a favorable seed at next weekend's New England Small College Athletic Conference (NESCAC) Championships. Popel played hard individually as well, though she was ultimately overtaken, 2-6, 6-2, 6-4.
Having logged a moral victory against the Lord Jeffs, the Lady Panthers crossed the ever-scenic lower stretches of the Connecticut River en route to New London's Connecticut College. Despite the school's history (until recently it was an all-female school), its female tennis players didn't merit as extreme treatment from Siegel as did the Amherst team. "We were such underdogs at Amherst that there wasn't really any pressure. . . but there wasn't much pressure at Conn Coll, either," Siegel remarked. True to form, Middlebury trumped the Camels, 8-1. On this second windy day, two of the more important wins were collected by the team's youngest members, Rebeccah Duvoisin '06 and Maren Manning '06, playing in the five and six spots.
The Lady Panthers returned home with a 1-1 record in hand, bringing their win-loss total for the season to 5-2. Next weekend, as they travel to Williams College for the NESCAC Championships, the girls are looking to bring home some statuary among their souvenirs. Having built momentum the entire season, Popel, Baker and the doubles teams are especially primed to come home with something for the mantle.
For the entire team, confidence is high after big wins at the Hilton Head Invitational, respectable stands against powerhouse teams from Tufts and Amherst and the victory over Conn College. Spring is certain of one thing this weekend: "We'll make an impact."
Accordingly, issuing a "no thank-you" to the proverbial wing-and-a-prayer, the girls are riding into Williamstown on this confidence. As Siegel's assessment has it, "We win what we're expected to win, and we do unexpectedly well against the big guys."