Women's Tennis swept by UMass in home opener

After a two-week postponement, UMass swept the UConn women’s tennis team in the Huskies’ first home match of the season.

The Huskies hosted the UMass Minutemen on Wednesday, holding their first dual match of the season. After three hours of play, the Minutemen walked away victorious. UMass won all three doubles matches, as well as all seven singles matches. Emotions ran high amongst all the players, but UConn was unable to break the strong performance of its competition. Only one singles match went to three sets, making this one of the Huskies’ weakest performances of the season.

“Overall, we were a little flat in doubles, not as sharp and energetic as I would’ve liked,” said UConn Coach Glenn Marshall. “Half the team’s singles put themselves in positions to win…Some of the other kids played pretty well, but their opponents were just a little stronger at each position.”

In doubles, the Huskies came up short across the board. Senior Abby McKeon and junior Jennifer Learmonth competed in No. 1 doubles, falling to UMass 8-5. In No. 2 doubles, junior Lucy Nutting and sophomore Maxie Weinberg lost 8-4. In No. 3 doubles, junior Marie Gargiulo and sophomore Emilie Burgess fell 8-2.

“We obviously tried our hardest in doubles,” said Weinberg. “We definitely picked it up in the second half, but we had a slow start.”

In singles, UConn pulled together a stronger performance, but was unable to walk away with a win. In No.1 singles, Weinberg fell to the Minutemen 6-3, 6-4. Freshman Srna Stoŝljević competed in No. 2 singles, falling in an emotionally charged 6-2, 6-1 loss. In No. 3 singles, Learmonth lost 6-0, 6-1 in the match. In No. 4 singles, Nutting lost 6-3, 3-6, 10-3, making her the only competitor for the Huskies to win a set. McKeon competed in No. 5 singles, losing to her opponent 6-0, 6-2. In No. 6 singles, sophomore Natalie Robson lost her match 6-2, 6-3. Finally, in No. 7 singles, freshman Alex Bergman fell to her competition 6-0, 6-2.

“I feel that I could’ve done better,” said Stoŝljević. “[My opponent] kind of moved me around more than I did to her. I kind of…just stayed behind the line.”

The Huskies will continue play through the remainder of the week, traveling to West Point, N.Y. for the Regional Championships. For the final tournament of the fall season, the Huskies will look to finish strong, especially after the rough loss to UMass on Wednesday. Over 60 schools from the northeast region, spanning from northern Maine to as far south as Philadelphia, are expected to attend, making it the single most competitive tournament of the fall season for the Huskies. In spite of the daunting challenge ahead, UConn is determined to end the season on a high note, even though that will certainly take some work after what was seen on Wednesday.

“There’s always room for improvement,” said Learmonth. “We got a lot to work on for Regionals this weekend.”