Women’s Tennis Earns First Win of 2020

Women%E2%80%99s+Tennis+overcame+some+early+season+struggles+against+Quinnipiac.+%28Gigi+Speer%29

Women’s Tennis overcame some early season struggles against Quinnipiac. (Gigi Speer)

The Fordham women’s tennis team started its 2020 campaign with a trip to Massachusetts, where it was handed losses at Harvard University and Boston College. Later in the week, the squad made its way to New Haven, Connecticut to battle against the Bobcats at Quinnipiac University.

The results would be quite the opposite. Junior Arina Taluyenko, sophomores Valeriya Deminova and Nicole Li, senior Maia Balce and freshmen Weronika Pociej and Avery Aude swept their respective singles matches.

In doubles, Deminova and Aude paired up to win their match 6-2, while Taluyenko and Pociej overtook Quinnipiac by the same score. The sophomore team of Genevieve Quenville and Li won its match 6-4.

After the fall campaign, first singles star Taluyenko was ranked 74th in the nation in the 2019 Oracle ITA Division I National Fall Rankings. She dominated Quinnipiac’s Kamilla Nella, taking the sets 6-2 and 6-3.

Fordham finished Atlantic 10 play ranked seventh in the conference last year, and after beating George Mason University in the first round of playoffs, dropped to second-ranked George Washington University in the second round.

The team hopes to continue getting solid wins before the start of conference matches in late March.

This 7-0 victory is a good way to propel Fordham into another difficult week, when they head to West Point to face Stony Brook University at 5:30 p.m. on Friday and Army University at 9 a.m. on Sunday.