Wrapping up the regular season on the West Coast, the Fordham Squash team had a perfect weekend against the University of California Los Angeles and the University of California Berkeley this past weekend.
The Rams started out their weekend with a 7-2 victory over UCLA.
Junior Bennett Van Liew kicked things off with a win in second position, defeating Micah Kim. Across three games, in which Kim put up a fight in both the first and final matches, Kim ultimately fell to Van Liew, 11-9, 11-4 and 12-10.
Third position senior Henry Frawley had a relatively easy time finishing off Andrii Tkachuk in three games, 11-6, 11-6, 11-2. In the fourth slot, sophomore Jack Stanley beat Shubhav Suri with a final game thriller favoring Stanley, 11-6, 11-4 and 12-10.
Continuing down the line, freshman Peter Vorbach secured a win at the fifth slot over Aadi Bhandari, 11-6, 11-5 and 11-8. Sixth position junior Robert Cruikshank added another tally to the Rams win column with his victory over Shaurya Jain, 11-5 11-6 and 11-4.
Wins in the seventh and eighth spots followed, with efforts from sophomore Gray Kearns and senior Nicholas Choo, respectively.
The two losses for the Rams came from two long fought battles. Sophomore Nicholas Gilman played the one slot against Freddy Manning of UCLA, taking the game to five rounds ultimately losing by six in the final match, 11-9, 11-7, 6-11, 8-11, 11-5. The other loss came from the nine slot as junior Aarav Jhunjhunwal lost in five as well, 7-11, 6-11, 11-4, 11-8, 11-9.
Next, the Rams turned their attention to Berkeley.
The Rams would continue to play long and taxing games, as Stanley won his match at fourth position over Richard Cherry Labourene in five games, 11-8, 4-11, 11-7, 8-11 and 11-6.
Vorbach easily procured his second win in three games on the weekend (11-6, 11-3, 12-10) over Vikram Bhamre.
Cruikshank also earned his second win of the day in four games (11-9, 11-5, 17-19, 11-9) over Varun Kandula with Kearns following suit and defeating Zachary Slonim in four games at seventh position (10-12, 11-7, 11-3, 11-8).
The Rams struggled in the second, third, eighth and ninth positions, conceding to Berkeley. With everything tied up, the final matchup came down to Gilman, who started off his sequence against Omar Cochiwala with two losses and a win. Going on to five games total (9-11, 11-4, 9-11, 11-5 and 11-6.), Gilman persevered and won it for the Rams with a total win count of 5-4.
Now, the regular season has finally drawn to a close, with the Rams finishing with a 21-9 record. They improve upon last season’s record of 20-11, as they finish with a 13-2 record at home. Fordham now will embark on the CSA Individual/Doubles Championships in Philadelphia, Pa., in which select members will be asked to compete. The Rams season has been nothing short of impressive and they’ll look to build upon this even more next season.
