W. Squash Has Four-Year Ivy Win Streak Snapped

In its final match on home courts this season, the No. 4 Harvard women’s squash team experienced something unknown to any of its members—an Ivy League loss.

After knocking off No. 5 Penn 7-2 on Saturday, the Crimson was felled by No. 3 Princeton 5-4 for the first time since the 1999-2000 season. For the first time in four years, the Harvard women’s squash team will not go undefeated in the Ivy League.

Princeton 5, Harvard 4

The Tigers (5-1, 5-1 Ivy) fought with the Crimson (5-2, 4-1) tooth and nail for every point and every game. The outcome was not decided until the eighth match finished, a five-game thriller in the No. 5 slot between sophomore Moira Weigel and Marilla Hiltz.

After Weigel took the first two games 9-5, 9-7, Hiltz—a childhood competitor of Weigel’s—clambered back to claim the next two games 9-6, 9-5.

“I just started giving her way too much at the front,” Weigel said. “She’s big, she can jump on stuff at the front.”

Hiltz, nearly a foot taller than her Harvard opponent, hit virtually all her shots in the fifth game with calm assurance, sealing both her and the team’s victory.

“Moira was playing a girl who was technically very good who had a slow start. Moira capitalized on that but she wasn’t able to close it out because [Hiltz] began to control the game,” said Harvard coach Satinder Bajwa.

Weigel said that part of her inability to shut down her opponent and take that final game was psychological.

“I have real trouble focusing when I get way up,” Weigel said. “It’s not cockiness, per se, it’s not simple arrogance, but it’s just difficult to maintain focus and maintain your intensity when you’re way ahead.”

Weigel was not the only Crimson player to fall in a tight five-game set. Sophomore Tina Browne, playing at No. 9, had a see-saw battle with Frances Comey before succumbing 5-9, 9-5, 10-8, 4-9, 1-9.

“That match just could have gone any way, it could have been 3-1 to us,” Bajwa said. “It was like the toss of a coin.”

The Crimson’s wins all came in the top four slots on the ladder. Co-captain Louisa Hall, the intercollegiate No. 4—who as the team’s lone senior was playing in her final match on Harvard courts—was her usual dominating self in the No. 1 slot. Hall took out her overmatched, younger opponent, intercollegiate No. 13 Claire Rein-Weston, in routine fashion 9-1, 9-2, 9-0.

Junior Lindsey Wilkins, the intercollegiate No. 8, had a hard-nosed, physical contest at No. 2, putting down intercollegiate No. 16 Ali Pearson 9-3, 9-2, 9-2, while freshmen intercollegiate No. 14 Audrey Duboc and No. 32 Lydia Williams playing at No. 3 and 4, respectively, won each of their matches 3-1.

Harvard now must win against No. 2 Yale this weekend to have a shot at a share of the Ivy title.

Harvard 7, Penn 2

It took gritty play from up and down the ladder to take out a Penn (8-3, 3-3) team that wouldn’t go down quietly. It may not have been pretty, but it was efficient, as the Crimson subdued the feisty Quakers 7-2.

“This was a great match for us, coming out of exams this last week,” Bajwa said. “Not to make excuses, but they’re acknowledgments, knowing that we had a tough time getting ourselves together.”

While Hall was up to her usual tricks in a 3-0 rout at No. 1, Wilkins had a slow start against intercollegiate No. 18 Paula Pearson. Wilkins found herself in a 1-5 hole in the first game before regaining the serve and her cool, storming back to take the match in three games 9-5, 9-3, 9-0.

The most impressive aspect of the overall contest, however, was Harvard’s ability to slam the door shut when it mattered. No. 8 Stephanie Hendricks, after claiming a 2-0 lead on two close games, had to fend off a fierce retaliation from Lorin Riley, who roared back to take the third game 9-1. Down 2-5 in the fourth game, Hendricks rallied to tie the score at five-all, pumping her fist and screaming, “let’s go!”

“That’s what I do,” Hendricks said of her verbal pyrotechnics. “Everyone makes fun of me…I don’t know. I’m a redhead. I need the energy, that’s what gets me going.”

The tactic worked, as Hendricks traded the lead and the serve with her opponent until she was finally able to put the game out of reach at 10-8.

“The fourth game was very important because they were long points,” Hendricks said. “A fifth game would have been a very tiring game.”

Duboc had an endurance trial at No. 3, swapping games with Dafna Wegner until the decisive fifth game. Duboc appeared to be losing momentum with a 9-4 loss in the fourth game and starting out down 1-3 in the fifth. With the final team outcome already decided, Wegner was playing only for pride and looked as though she would win on sheer desperation. But Duboc finally exploded, dipping into deep splits to reach the ball and sending Wegner running all over the court as she notched the victory 9-3.

Duboc credited the raucous crowd and it’s chants of “you rock, Duboc” with keeping her pumped up.

“After every point I just tried to keep with it and think about the next point, and take it point by point, instead of thinking about the outcome,” Duboc said.

—Staff writer Lisa J. Kennelly can be reached at kennell@fas.harvard.edu.