The Fordham women’s tennis team made their way up north this past weekend, with the Rams traveling to the west bank of the Hudson in order to compete in the Army West Point Invitational. Fordham was not the only school to make this trip, as the three-day tournament featured a plethora of local teams, with The Big Red of Cornell University, the Huskies of the University of Connecticut (UConn), the Knights of Fairleigh Dickinson University, the Pirates of Seton Hall University and the Wildcats of Villanova University being just a few of the other teams present.
Overall, the weekend is best characterized as one of individual successes for the Rams, as while many of the team’s players made deep and highly impressive runs in their respective flights, the team struggled mightily in the doubles portion of the competition.
Looking first at the positives, both of Fordham’s representatives made some noise in Singles Flight A, as both graduate student Raffaela Alhach and senior transfer Rose Hu were able to put themselves in the win column. First, looking at Alhach, she grinded out gritty wins her first two matches (7-5, 6-2 and 6-4, 7-6(4) respectively), before unfortunately falling to Lauren Stein of Cornell in the quarterfinals. Hu, on the other hand, dominated Maria Constantinou of UConn 6-3, 6-1 in her first-round matchup, before unfortunately losing, however, in the second round against one of Cornell University’s strongest players in Emma Baker.
Singles Flight B likewise saw some strong performances from the Rams, with graduate student Demi Jhaveri, junior Lorraine Bergmann and freshman Cindy Zhou all dispatching their respective first-round opponents prior to their second-round losses. Most notable, however, was the dominance that freshman Anlin Xie displayed so early into her college career, as she was able to impressively play her way into the Singles Flight B final (where she would unfortunately not prevail), gaining the title of Flight B’s runner-up after defeating Marist College’s Deana Giambo, Army West Point’s Paulina Feoli, UConn’s Cameron Didion and Villanova University’s Miriam Gondorova all in straight sets.
Singles Flight C likewise saw a Fordham player make it to the championship round, with senior Eleni Fasoula continuing her strong senior campaign by gaining a finals berth on the back of four straight impressive victories. Like Xie, she would unfortunately fall just short, with her stellar run ending in a championship round defeat against Army’s Emily Ruckno 7-6(5), 6-0. Graduate student Franny Shea and freshman Julianne Nyugen also both managed to notch a win for Fordham in Flight C, with Shea pulling out a hard-fought 6-4, 4-6, 14-12 victory and Nyugen defeating Rider’s Jett Cozette in straight sets before they both stumbled against their respective second-round opponents.
Looking finally at Singles Flight D, the Rams’ only fielded a single player, with sophomore Sofie Siem being the lone representative for Fordham in the section. Despite this, she made the Rams’ presence felt, defeating her first two opponents in straight sets on the way to a quarter-finals berth.
Turning now to the doubles portion of the tournament, the Rams struggled in this half of the competition to achieve the same sort of high-level success that they found on the singles side. Elaborating on this, two of Fordham’s four doubles pairings bowed out in the first round, with the pairing of Xie and Hu falling 6-3, and Shea and Jhaveri seeing their journey cut short with a 6-4 defeat. The pairing of Fasoula and Alhach likewise saw their soirée in the doubles bracket cut short, as despite the solid 6-4 victory that they grinded out in the first round, they fell to a Colgate duo 7-5 shortly thereafter. The duo of Nyugen and Zhou had the most success out of Fordham’s doubles pairings, however, managing to rattle off two straight victories to secure a berth in the quarter-finals (they would, unfortunately, suffer a 6-4 defeat there to a UConn pairing).
All in all, as aforementioned, it was really more of a mixed bag for the Rams this past weekend, with the team not exhibiting the same sort of consistent dominance that was on display last weekend. Yet, there are still many things to build upon, with the experience and leadership of Fasoula and the infusion of young talent that is Xie providing something to get truly excited about going forward.
Looking ahead, the Rams have this coming weekend off, with their next appearance in an official tournament not being until they travel to the oak-laden grounds of Harvard University to compete in the ITA Northeast Regionals on Oct. 6.
Until then, the Rams will likely be trying to iron out any issues that reared their ugly heads this weekend, hoping to continue their rather strong start to their season.
