While the Dartmouth men's squash team brought home two victories from Maine on Sunday defeating Bates College and Bowdoin College the women fell to Stanford University, 6-3, on Sunday at Williams College.
The Big Green men (8-5, 0-3 Ivy) began their doubleheader with a 6-3 win over Bates (17-6, 5-2 NESCAC). After an initial 3-2 Dartmouth deficit, the Bobcats and the Big Green battled it out in the last matches, with impressive wins from Chris Hanson '13 in the number one spot, who won in three games, and Michael Lewis '11 in the third spot.
"The last four guys to go on court managed to win, which was huge for us," Brian O'Toole '12 said. "I think the win really gave us confidence because we were in a tough spot and were able to rise to the occasion."
One of the closest matches highlighted some sibling rivalry as Luke Lee '12 defeated his brother, junior Dae Ro Lee, in five games.
"While I was on court, I didn't realize that the team score was that close and that we really needed my win," Luke Lee said. "I've always played with [my brother], so we both knew each other's game well and it was going to be a good match."
The momentum that Dartmouth accumulated from the wins at Bates carried over to the matches against Bowdoin (10-7) later that day. The Big Green swept the Polar Bears in a 9-0 victory, winning six of the matches in three straight games.
"Although we were tired from playing and traveling when we got to Bowdoin, every player knew what he had to do and won handily," Hanson said.
The team looks to continue its three-game winning streak when it faces off against Princeton University and the University of Pennsylvania at home on Saturday and Sunday, respectively.
"[Our performance this week] should help us next weekend against Penn and Princeton," O'Toole said. "Just knowing that we've been in pressure situations before and performed well gives us a lot of extra confidence."
Despite the loss to Stanford, co-captain Elizabeth Weintraub '10 said that the matches were beneficial for the Big Green (3-5, 0-3 Ivy).
"I think overall we were pretty pleased with our performance," Weintraub said. "We went in there as the lower ranked team and [Stanford] had just beaten Williams, 8-1. But, we went in there confident and proved that we can compete with higher-ranked teams."
Valeria Wiens '13, Hannah Conant '11 and Libbey Brown '10 won their matches at the one, four and five spots, respectively.
Corey Schafer '13 battled at the number two spot before losing, 3-1.
"Although we ended up losing, we had really good faith," Schafer said. "Our team knew that these were matches that we could win and we wanted to prove ourselves."
The women's squad will compete against Princeton and Penn on Saturday before meeting Mt. Holyoke College on Sunday in non-conference competition.
"We want to play good matches," Weintraub said. "Hopefully our momentum will carry over."
