Women’s Tennis suffered a 5-1 loss to Temple University on Saturday, putting an end to their five-match winning streak. The defeat marks the second road loss for a Fordham team that has been exceptional playing away from home. 

Inclement weather was a factor all weekend. Sunday’s matchup against Atlantic 10 opponent St. Joseph’s University and doubles competition on Saturday against Temple were canceled due to impending rain. Fordham was able to play all six singles matches on Saturday, with junior Avery Aude accounting for their only point. Junior Rachelle Yang and senior Genevieve Quenville suffered their first losses in singles play as Temple emerged victorious in five of the six singles matches. 

The loss is Fordham’s first defeat in a month, with their last loss coming at the hands of Brown University on Feb. 26. Fordham had outscored opponents 27-5 over the course of their five match winning streak. Even with the loss, the 8-3 Rams still have the second highest winning percentage in the A-10 behind only 13-4 Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU). 

Eyeing the remaining four games of Fordham’s current road stretch, they’ll have no easy landing after last Saturday’s loss. The Rams are set to face a red hot UMass team this Sunday at 1 p.m.. They currently sit at 10-4, are third best in the A-10 and tied for the second-most wins in the conference. UMass has won four of their last five and 10 of their last 12 matches. They’ll look for their second straight win against Quinnipiac University on Wednesday before the Sunday matchup versus Fordham. 

Looking past UMass, matchups against 3-13 North Carolina Central and 6-8 University of Rhode Island sandwich another tough A-10 matchup against 9-6 Davidson. Fordham has played well up until this point on the road, now 4-2 away from home, and could come out of this stretch feeling strong with a couple of tough wins. 

Fordham is already in an excellent position to make a run in the A-10 tournament this season and just bolstered their roster for next year with the acquisition of University of Utah senior Lindsay Hung. Hung has verbally committed to transfer to Fordham Women’s Tennis for the fall of 2022. A former five-star recruit out of high school, Hung will come to Fordham as a graduate student with four years of collegiate experience under her belt. Hung has a Universal Tennis Rating (UTR) of 9.76, placing her in the upper echelon of female tennis players at the D1 level. The Rams have excelled in the first season of head coach Mike Sowter’s tenure with the women’s team, and have put themselves in an excellent position to carry on that success into next season with the addition of a valuable and experienced player. Exciting things are sure to come, both this year and beyond.