W. Tennis Squelches BU in Spring Season Opener

In the opener of its spring dual match season, the Harvard women’s tennis team thumped Boston University 7-0 at the BU Track and Tennis Center Sunday afternoon. Led by co-captain Courtney Bergman and sophomore Elsa O’Riain at the top of the lineup, the Crimson swept the singles and doubles without dropping a set.

The Terriers fought fiercely and scrapped for every point, forcing Harvard to grind it out in longer rallies rather than putting away quick, clean winners. But the Crimson was sharp and showed no signs of having just emerged from the burden of final exam period.

“It’s always difficult to play after finals,” senior Alexis Martire said. “You have to get yourself back in the rhythm of the game. But a lot of us took a lot of time to work out over finals, so we were well prepared.”

Competing for the first time in BU’s new tennis center, Harvard had to deal with playing on a court that resembled the track running around it. But though the court’s material was significantly different from that in the Murr Center, the Crimson was able to make the necessary adjustments without too much difficulty.

“There were a few scary moments in the beginning when the ball took some strange bounces,” O’Riain said. “But we figured [the court] out pretty quickly.”

The win against the Terriers came despite the absences of co-captain Susanna Lingman and junior Eva Wang, who sat out the game to recuperate from nagging injuries in preparation for the USTA/ITA National Team Indoors Championship in Madison, Wisc., that begins tomorrow. But Harvard hardly looked like it needed any more help.

“Susanna and Eva were resting for nationals,” O’Riain said. “We knew we would probably beat BU anyway.”

And beat BU they did. O’Riain and Bergman played at the No. 1 doubles spot and secured a 8-3 win over the Terriers’ top pair. Martire and sophomore Preethi Mukundan’s 8-3 victory at No. 3 was simply the icing on the cake after freshman Celia Durkin and junior Melissa Anderson secured the doubles point with a win at No. 2.

The Crimson fared equally well in the singles matches, with O’Riain winning at No. 1, 7-5, 6-3. Martire extended Harvard’s lead with a 6-4, 6-3 victory at No. 4, before Durkin, Mukundan, Anderson, and sophomore Cindy Chu prevailed in straight sets to complete the Crimson’s sweep.

“[BU] played well and [was] really scrappy,” Martire said. “But we took our 40 days off pretty seriously. We were in really good shape, and we played a little more aggressive.”

The high level of tennis was a good sign for Harvard, considering that it will face much stiffer competition in Madison. Among the teams present will be all four of the semifinalists from last year’s NCAA Championships.

“All winter, we have been training pretty hard for this,” O’Riain said. “Our depth is amazing, and we have a good chance of doing well. The team will be brilliant.”

—Staff writer Karan Lodha can be reached at klodha@fas.harvard.edu.