On the weekend of Oct. 13, the women’s tennis team debuted the school’s new tennis facilities in a three day contest against Trinity, Colby and Skidmore.
The school broke ground on the new tennis facility this past summer, locating it between South Street Field and the school’s outdoor track. The complex has 12 courts, an increase from the number of courts beside Proctor Dining Hall, and also helps the school clear space for the future student center, to be located where the Proctor tennis courts currently are. As part of the creation of the new tennis facility, the school moved the throwing areas for the track team.
“The new courts are awesome. Actually, we weren't expecting them to be done in the fall, but then [Middlebury Director of Athletics] Erin Quinn dropped the news that they were so that was really exciting,” Nina Farhat ’25 said. “We like them because we're now near a bunch of the rest of the athletics, so we have the soccer games going on. We can hear field hockey in the background. Proctor is kind of alone on its isolated hill.”
The women’s team had enormous success during their first formal competition on the new courts. In the mid-October matches, the team went a combined 30–2 in singles and doubles combined.
In singles, Farhat, Sahana Raman ’25, Claudia Miller ’25 and Elsie Van Wieren ’28 each went 3–0 all in straight sets, giving Middlebury a 17–1 record in singles. In doubles, the duos of Miller and Van Wieren and Raman and Farhat both went undefeated.
The tournament marked a strong conclusion to the fall portion of the Panthers schedule. In the fall, the team had a combined record of 58–8 in singles and 34–5 in doubles. In September, a number of women’s tennis players also performed well at the ITA Regionals hosted by Bowdoin College. Raman made it to the semifinals of the tournament while Farhat and Van Wieren were both quarterfinalists.
“The Fall went really, really well. We have three really cool freshmen that just joined our team, which added a bunch of really great positive energy,” Farhat said. “So we're really excited about that, and overall, we ended up doing really great, which we were super excited about.”
The team’s early season success is a continuation of the team’s success from last season. The team made it to the semifinals of the NESCAC tournament before a 5–4 lose to Amherst, and then made it to the quarterfinals of the NCAA tournament before a 5–3 loss to #1 ranked Claremont-Mudd-Scripps Colleges’ consortium team.
The women’s tennis team will resume their 2024-2025 season and continue to play on the new courts in March of next year.
Farhat expressed happiness at the rejuvenated energy of the team and is optimistic about what the spring will hold for the women’s tennis team.
“This year we have three new freshmen. We also have an interim head coach this year, which is different from the head coach we had last year, so she brings a lot of really great energy, and she's been pushing us in many ways, on and off the court,” Farhat said. “I think in the spring we’ll be at full force and really excited to play.”
Jack McGuire (he/him) is a Senior Sports Editor.
Jack previously served as a Sports Editor and as a Staff Writer. He also spent this past summer working as a News Reporting Intern for Seven Days.
Jack is also majoring in economics with minors in political science and film and media culture.
