Tufts Sets Program Record for Wins with Victory Over Trinity in Women's Tennis First Round
Courtesy Tufts Sports Information
AMHERST, Mass. – The Tufts women's tennis team easily advanced past Trinity in the first round of the NESCAC Championship on Friday morning at Amherst, 6-0. The Jumbos, seeded third, improved to 14-5 overall to set a new school record for victories in a season. Tufts will face second-seeded Amherst, the five-time defending NESCAC champions, on Saturday at 9:00 a.m.
Trinity College, the No. 6 seed, finished its season with a 7-6 record. Coach Kate Bayard's Jumbos surpassed the previous wins record of 13 established by the 2006-07 Jumbos.
The #11 in the nation Jumbos decisively won doubles, 3-0. The top pair of junior co-captain Julia Browne (Old Brookville, N.Y.) and senior co-captain Meghan McCooey (Cumberland, R.I.), and the #2 duo of first years Lindsay Katz (Baltimore, Md.) and Janice Lam (San Francisco, Calif.) both won by 8-1 scores. The closest match of the morning came in #3 doubles, where Jumbos Jennifer LaCara (Huntington Station, N.Y.) and Edwina Stewart (London, England) defeated Trinity's Arielle Leben and Jillian Steckloff by an 8-4 score.
Tufts entered singles play needing just two wins to seal the match. They accomplished that quickly, with two of the matches ending simultaneously for the 6-0 final. Browne, the top-ranked player in the Northeast, defeated Bantam Hillary Hoyt 6-1, 6-1 at #1. Katz won 6-0, 6-1 on the fourth singles court against Leben, while doubles teammate Lam posted a 6-1, 6-0 victory against Olivia Merns in the #5 match.
This is the third straight year that Tufts has played in the NESCAC semifinals. The Jumbos lost 6-3 to Amherst when the teams met during the regular season on April 20.
