On Sept. 11, SUNY New Paltz women’s tennis, former Athletic Conference (SUNYAC) champions, took a harsh first loss of the season to Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI), 8-1.
In the doubles section of the match, second-year Trinity Chow and second-year Laura Koob lost 8-7 to RPI’s first-year Alex Mednikova and first-year Rani Jones. This loss cannot undermine this Hawk duo’s strength, as Chow and Koob earned SUNYAC Doubles Team of the Year and Doubles First-Team All-SUNYAC in their freshmen seasons.
The second doubles set mimicked the first, as the Lady Hawks’ fourth-year Victoria Zezula and third-year Jenna Grandville lost 8-7. They were up against RPI second-year Brenda Peng and second-year Sanjana Surapeneni, last season’s All-Liberty League Honorable Mention for doubles duo.
The final doubles set was also taken by RPI’s first-year Chloe Barr and first-year Krisia Flores 8-2, dominating over New Paltz’s first-year Onalee Batcheller and second-year Alexandra Dratch.
Chow lost the first singles set to Mednikova with a score of the first game 6-4 and the second 6-4, respectively. In the second, Koob competed against Jones, winning the only set of the match, outscoring Jones 6-4 and 6-0, respectively. Surapeneni overtook Zezula 6-1 in both games, losing the third set for New Paltz.
Grandville went up against Barr in the fourth singles set, losing the first and second games 6-3 and 6-2, respectively. In the fifth set, Batcheller held Flores to three games, losing the first 6-4, but winning the second 6-4. The sudden death game of the set ended with Flores on top, 10-5. RPI first-year Nitya Subramaniam closed out the sixth and final singles set, winning two games over New Paltz second-year Alex Chimenti.
After the loss to RPI, the Lady Hawks traveled to the Vassar Scramble this past weekend to play against New York University (NYU), Vassar College (VC) and Connecticut College (CC).
On Saturday, there were 15 total doubles matches, but the Lady Hawks lost 13 of them to NYU, CC and VC with varied scoring margins. However, in first doubles, Batcheller and Dratch beat CC’s third-year Hayley Zuckerberg and third-year Elena Erdekian 8-5. The Batcheller and Dratch duo also defeated CC 8-5 in second doubles. Chow and Koob took the final win for the Hawks during second doubles, defeating CC’s second-year Meredith Kenny and first-year Brooke Scully 8-5.
In the first singles matches on Sunday, Koob took on NYU’s first-year Lucy Avant, winning 8-0. Batcheller beat NYU second-year Ana Leonard in a three-game set, 6-4, 3-6 and 1-0, respectively. Grandville beat CC’s Erdekian 6-2 in both games of the set. Koob defeated NYU’s fourth-year Rupa Ganesh 6-3 and 6-2, respectively. Second-year Kathleen Mangan won the final set of singles against CC scoring 4-6, 6-4 and 1-0, respectively.
In the second round of single-sets, third-year Emma Messenger beat CC’s Pandit 6-2 and 7-5, respectively. Third-year Ava Sweeney beat NYU’s first-year Claire Huang in a three-game set scoring 6-7, 6-1 and 1-0 respectively.
Sweeney, Messenger, Zezula, Dratch, Chimenti, Koob, Grandville, Batcheller and Mangan all picked up losses in the singles section of the tournament.
The team is back on the road Sept. 20 at 3 p.m. against SUNY Oswego and Sept. 21 at 1 p.m. against SUNY Cortland, beginning on the road to win the next six conference games.
