Tennis Road Trips Bring Mixed Results

The Harvard tennis teams had vastly different weekends, with the men’s team enjoying the Southern hospitality afforded them by Oklahoma State and Tulsa and the women’s team receiving a rude welcome from Georgia Tech and South Carolina.

The No. 47 Harvard men’s team (2-0) steamrolled the Cowboys 6-1 and the Golden Hurricane 5-2, dominating both matches with contributions from nearly its entire roster.

“The team has a real depth to it,” Associate Men’s Coach Peter Mandeau said. “I haven’t seen the same type of depth before.”

The junior-freshman “train” combination of Oli Choo and Jonathan Chu won the first doubles match 8-5 against Oklahoma. Sophomores David Lingman and Chris Chiou won in the second doubles slot, and captain Dalibor Snyder teamed with sophomore Mark Riddell to complete the sweep.

In singles competition, Harvard won five of six matches. Chu, Lingman, and Chiou all won, as did sophomore George Turner and freshman Brian Wan, playing in the fourth and fifth singles positions, respectively. Choo suffered the Crimson’s only loss, falling 7-5, 6-3 in the third singles position.

Harvard was more closely challenged by Tulsa but still managed to prevail. Chu, Lingman, Wagner, and Wan won their singles matches, as did the doubles teams of Chiou-Lingman and Riddell-Snyder.

“We didn’t really know what to expect last weekend,” Mandeau said. “We went into the weekend with a lot of confidence.”

The Harvard men return to action this Saturday when they host the Purdue Boilermakers.

For the No. 39 Harvard women, their weekend of competition proved to be more difficult against No. 37 Georgia Tech and No. 22 South Carolina.

“They were both pretty tough matches,” junior Sanja Bajin said.

A pair of freshmen, No. 21 Courtney Bergman and Susanna Lingman, accounted for all of the Crimson points. Each player won both of her singles matches over the weekend.

Against South Carolina, the freshmen pair played second doubles and defeated the Gamecock duo of Jamie Wong and Laura Ozolins 8-6. Bergman played first singles and defeated South Carolina’s Mysti Morris 7-5, 6-2. Lingman played fourth singles and pulled away from her opponent 6-3, 6-0.

“[Bergman and Lingman] were really tough,” Bajin said. “They played great tennis and have a great attitude.”

Bergman and Lingman also carried the Crimson banner against the Georgia Tech. Although they fell 9-8 in their doubles match, the freshman pair managed to retain their composure and win their singles matches.

Bergman defeated Katarina Markovski 6-2, 6-3 in the first singles match. Lingman followed up her partners success in the fourth singles match, defeating Lynn-Yin Tan 7-5, 6-0.

The Crimson women will look to improve in its next competition, on March 2nd against No. 28 Miami.

“We just fell a little short [this weekend],” Bergman said. “There’s not much we can do except work harder.”