By TARA CANGIALOSI

The Fordham University women’s tennis squad saw its season come to an end on Friday, April 25, with a 4-0 loss to top-seeded Virginia Commonwealth University at the 2014 Atlantic 10 Championships at the Lindner Family Tennis Center in Mason, Ohio.

With the loss, the Rams’ spring season record closed at 10-11, a mark that does not demonstrate their high level of play at the season’s end.

For the past two weeks, Fordham peaked in its level of play as a team. Throughout their last five regular season matches, the Rams upended three teams in a row and fell by close margins in their two losses.

The Rams first lost to out-of-conference rival Temple University on April 9 by a score of 5-2. The team fell short, dropping both completed doubles matches and winning only two of the six singles matches.

Despite losing to the Owls, Fordham came back strong against A-10 opponent University of Rhode Island on April 12, upending the Kingston-based Rams 6-1. The Rams took two of the three doubles matches and five of the six singles matches. Sarah Ali, Bella Genkina, Angie Dabu, Julie Leong and Destiny Grunin picked up wins at spots two through six.

After the two away matches, the Rams returned home on April 14 for a match against the Long Island University Blackbirds on the Hawthorn/Rooney Courts.

The Rams dominated the court, winning all three doubles and singles matches in sweeping fashion, giving them the 7-0 win.

Although the individual matches themselves were fairly close, the Rams battled back and came out on top each time. Grunin, the freshman, won her match against Brittany Thompson at sixth singles 6-3, 7-6 (7-3) to complete the singles sweep and secure the overall match victory.

Two days later, the Rams traveled to Poughkeepsie, N.Y. to face the Marist Red Foxes in another out-of-conference match.

The team’s momentum from the wins against URI and LIU propelled it to a 6-1 victory, where again, the Rams won all three doubles matches, and then five of six singles matches. In one of her best-played matches of the season, Leong bounced back from a first set loss at fourth singles, winning the second and third sets by identical 6-0 scores.

In the final regular season match of the year on April 21, the Rams lost to the New York Institute of Technology 5-2 on Fordham’s home courts.

NYIT, the 11th best team in the country at the NCAA Division II level, played an exceptional match against the Division 1 Rams.

The Bears won the doubles point, taking all three matches, and then continued to dominate in the singles competition, winning four of six matches to give them the overall victory.

Although the Rams ended their season on a loss, their previous three wins helped boost them to an eight seed at the Atlantic 10 Championships, with the opening rounds on Thursday, April 24, and the final match on Sunday, April 27.

Going into the tournament, the Rams felt they were well-matched against their opponents in the A-10 and could come out with several solid victories.

In their opening match, the Rams again faced URI, who earned the ninth seed. Similar to their regular season match, the Bronx-based Rams upended the Rams from Kingston, this time taking the match 4-0.

“Winning three matches in a row definitely gave us momentum going into the conference tournament, especially since we drew Rhode Island in the first round,” Dabu said in an email. “We had just played them so we knew what to expect and what to prepare for.”

Fordham first won the doubles point, as it won both completed matches. At first doubles, Elliesa Ball and Ali defeated Nithila Asokaraj and Kathleen Uy, 8-1, while Genkina and Hanna Fritzinger defeated Taylor Holden and Jordan Rucks, 8-4, at third doubles. Dabu and Leong were ahead of Galina Chernykh and Elizaveta Sadovnikov, 6-4, at second doubles, but play was halted and the match did not count.

The Rams then won the match during singles play, when Genkina beat Sadovnikov 6-1, 6-2 at fourth singles and Leong upended Asokaraj 6-4, 6-3 at the fifth spot. At third singles, Dabu clinched the match for the Rams, as she was victorious over Uy 6-0, 6-3.

The win sent Fordham into the next round but against the top-seeded Rams from VCU. The Rams’ second round match was played indoors, due to the inclement weather.

Fordham lost the doubles point, as Fritzinger and Genkina fell to Ludivine Burguiere and Sitilia Rencheli, 8-1, at third doubles, and Leong and Dabu were upended by Salome Kvitashvili and Olga Terteac at second doubles, 8-2.

VCU moved on to the next round when it won the first three completed singles matches. Burguiere defeated Leong 6-0, 6-2 at fifth singles Olga Barscheuskaya bested Genkina at the fourth position, 6-2, 6-1, and Daria Yakauleva clinched the match with her 6-2, 6-2 win over Ali at second singles.

Unfortunately, both Grunin and Dabu were ahead in their matches at sixth and third singles, respectively, when play was halted. This occurred because VCU had already secured the match, and the results would not impact the final overall score.

Although the Rams did not come out of the A-10 Championship with the results they had looked to achieve all season, they should still be proud. Despite the up-and-down nature of the spring season, individual and team play improved as time progressed.

By the season’s end, the Rams were playing as a much more cohesive unit, especially on the doubles front. Their three victories out of the last five regular season matches are a sign of a team on the rise for next year.

After this season, the Rams will lose two seniors in Dabu and Fritzinger, who played on the team all four years.

“The past four years of tennis have definitely been a learning experience for me, and they have helped me grow so much as a person, not just a tennis player,” Dabu said. “I’ll be sure to keep the memories with me and look back on them with a smile on my face.”

The rest of the team is currently composed of five rising seniors, and one rising sophomore. Freshman players will commit to the team in the coming months. The Rams will look to build off of this season’s success, and come back stronger than ever for the fall 2014 season.

Tara Cangialosi is Web Editor at The Fordham Ram.