Unfortunately the Big Green came up empty, losing a heartbreaker on Friday to Columbia 4-3, and then falling on Saturday to Cornell 5-2. Both games were at the Boss Tennis Center.
While things might look bleak for the Big Green women (4-11, 0-2 Ivy) and the rest of their season, they still have plenty of things to be proud of, most notably senior co-captain Ann Scott '06.
Against Columbia (10-5, 2-0 Ivy), Scott was unable to come up with the victory in doubles with her partner Jamie Caplan '09, losing a real close match 9-7 (4). Typically a loss like that can take a lot out of a player, mentally and physically. But not for Scott.
When singles rolled around she trounced her opponent Nina Suda in straight sets 6-3, 6-1, proving to everyone what it really means to be the leader of the team.
"I played really well today and it was a nice change from playing against my BU opponent who didn't hit the ball that hard," Scott said. "I usually play well against girls who hit hard and that's what happened today against Columbia."
Her Dartmouth teammates quickly followed her lead and went up on the Lions 3-1 after Megan Zebroski '08 and Natalie O'Rourke '08 posted an 8-4 victory at No. 1 doubles and Lindsay Winingham '07 and Kerry Snow '07 picked up the doubles point with an 8-3 win in their match.
Up 3-1 and needing only one win to capture the match, however, things started to fall apart for Dartmouth. Caplan fought hard in her match before falling 6-4, 6-1, and Catja Carrell '08 also fell in straight sets 6-4, 6-3, but not without some controversy.
Carrell was down 4-3 in the second set, but she was apparently up 30-40 when she hit a winner. Carrell was confident that she had just tied up the second set, but her opponent disagreed.
She disputed the score and after a long argument with the line judge it was decided that it was in fact deuce. Carrell would go on to lose that game and was burned by another questionable line call in the next game.
"Bad calls are unfortunately a part of tennis," said head coach Bob Dallis. He went on to add, however, that "one point is never going to be the difference in a match."
With the score all tied up at 3-3 it came down to the No. 1 singles match on center court. Zebroski and her opponent Milena Kachar were very evenly matched and traded amazing shots, much to the delight of the crowd. But a couple of points didn't go Zebroski's way and Columbia's top gun found a way to pull out the match 7-6, 7-5.
The next day against Cornell the Big Green got off to a slower start and dropped the doubles point despite Zebroski and O'Rourke's 8-6 win at the No. 1 spot.
When singles rolled around Dartmouth lost four out of the six matches, but they were all battles as four matches went to third sets.
Once again the go-to-girl for the Big Green was Scott, who showed her ability to battle back after losing the first set to pull out the win 6-7, 6-4, 6-4.
After Scott, Snow was Dartmouth's only other player to win both of her weekend singles matches. At third singles, the junior followed a 6-2, 6-2 victory over Columbia's Tamara John with a similar 6-2, 6-1 trouncing of Cornell's Sydney Murray.
It was also a very comforting sight to have Winingham playing well once again. Before her wrist injury, she was the team's ace and once she gets fully healthy the team will receive a huge boost. After falling 6-2, 6-0 at No. 2 singles against Columbia, she played considerably better in a 4-6, 6-2, 6-4 loss to Cornell's No. 2 Kasia Preneta.
Dartmouth hopes that Winingham's continued improvement will help the team emerge in the next few weeks as a force in the Ivy League.
The Big Green continues league play next Friday when the team travels to New Jersey to take on Princeton. The match will get underway at 2 p.m.
