Women’s tennis remains undefeated this winter as they beat Boston College on Friday, 4-3, and closed out the weekend with a 4-1 victory over Fordham University.
With Dartmouth and Boston College tied 3-3 on Friday night, all eyes turned to the first singles between Dartmouth’s Peyton Capuano ’27 and Boston College’s Olivia Benton. They broke each other throughout the set, but Capuano found her stride in the final games and won 7-5 to put the Big Green on top.
In the doubles matchups, Dartmouth’s first doubles team, featuring Capuano and Michela Moore ’27, came back from an early 3-0 deficit to beat the Eagles’ first doubles team, 7-5. On the second court, Alexandra Orlins ’29 and Sam Grosjean ’28 were locked at 6-6 with the Eagles, but lost the tiebreaker 7-5. On the third court, Boston College’s Natalie Eordekian and Nadia Barteck won the set 6-4 against third doubles team Josephine Lombardi ’29 and Lauren Han ’28 to take the doubles point for the Eagles.
Head coach Bob Dallis said that “we probably didn’t get off to the start we would have liked to in losing the doubles point, but I think the women did a really good job of just saying, ‘Okay, we lost the doubles point. We’re not going to let that doubles point define the match.’”
In the singles matchups, Boston College’s Glowacka beat Han, 6-1, 6-1, to gain the second point for the Eagles at the fourth singles match.
Dallis was proud of Han’s resilience. “Things didn’t work out for [Han], but she never really hung her head,” he said.
At the sixth singles, Dartmouth’s Grosjean won a close first set 7-5, before a commanding 6-1 second set win to get Dartmouth’s first point of the night.
Moore got off to a good start on court 2 with a 6-1 win in the first set against Boston College’s Seren Agar, reeling off six straight games after dropping the first. She did not slow in the second set, cruising to a 6-3 victory to even the overall match score between the Big Green and the Eagles to 2-2.
At the third singles, Orlins grabbed the first set after a 7-4 tiebreaker at six games apiece. In the second set, the match was tied 2-2 before Eordekian defaulted, earning the Big Green another point.
Tied up at 3-3, the match would be decided by first singles. Capuano climbed to an early 3-0 lead in the first set, before dropping three straight games to even the score at 3-all. The two then battled to even the set at 6-6 before Capuano handily won the tiebreaker. However, Benton fought to come back in the second set, winning 6-4 to force the match into a decisive third set.
In the decider, Capuano got off to an early 4-0 lead, breaking Benton’s first two service games. Benton responded by breaking Capuano’s serve twice, and the set was eventually tied 5-5 with the entire match on the line. With the pressure on, Capuano was able to break Benton’s serve and then hold her own, clinching the set on an ace and securing the 4-3 victory for the Big Green.
“In those last couple of points, [Capuano] really committed to what she was doing, so she forced the girl to miss,” Dallis said.
“I think what helps her win is her own energy as well as ours,” Grosjean said. “Pumping herself up … her fist bumps, all of that really helps her [when it’s] very stressful, when it’s tight like that last match.”
The result marks a major improvement from Dartmouth’s 6-1 loss to Boston College last year.
“I think it was very clear, maybe our tennis is similar, maybe a little bit better than last year, but I think we really showed up,” captain Brooke Hess ’26 said. “Across the board, everyone played for each other to win.”
The win also brings the team to a 2-0 start in the spring season. Dallis was proud of his team’s performance and mindset throughout the match.
“Super excited to win the match,” Dallis said. “I think more importantly was the level of resilience that we showed within the match. There were a lot of things that went against us. There were a lot of things that went in our favor.”
The Big Green then won 4-1 against Fordham on Saturday afternoon.
Going into the match, Dallis said the team’s goals were to “play with a lot of resilience, to play with a lot of love and to play with a lot of enthusiasm” and to improve “technically” and “tactically.”
First doubles team Moore and Capuano and second doubles Grosjean and Orlins both won, to clinch the doubles point.
In singles, Capuano won her first set 6-1, then got up 2-1 in the second set before her opponent Paola Ueno Dalmonicio retired, giving the Big Green a second point. At third singles, Orlins beat Fordham’s Liliana Chitambar 6-0, 6-2 to bring the overall match score to 3-0. However, Fordham got one point when Catalina Padilla Udaeta beat Dartmouth’s Caroline Lemke ’27 on Court 6, winning both sets 6-2. Dartmouth clinched the victory with Michela Moore’s 6-0, 7-6 (1) victory in the second set.
The Big Green are back at Boss Tennis Center this Saturday at 1 p.m. against the Boston University Terriers in hopes of remaining undefeated.
