Squash finishes strong
Team ends with second place at nationals
Joanna Kao—The Tech
The MIT Squash team came in second (3-6) to Vanderbilt on Sunday after three days of matches at the 2011 Men’s National Team Championships this weekend. In squash, the scores indicate the number of match wins of one team’s top nine against the other team’s corresponding nine. The squash team won 6-3 against the University of Washington on Friday in the first round of competition and 5-4 against UC Berkeley during Saturday’s semifinals at Harvard.
Vanderbilt came into the weekend as the underdog, but they proved themselves over the weekend by beating two teams they were not expected to win against.
“We kicked butt. We weren’t expecting such a fierce Chaffee Cup bracket, and we’re psyched to bring home a runner-up trophy. We really thought we’d sweep the division and were impressed by Vanderbilt’s showing,” said Nadeem A. Mazen ’06, head coach. “Every match was close: U Washington and Cal Berkeley also had a great showing, and we showed great sportsmanship and spirit all the way through.”
MIT’s first and fourth seeded players, West D. Hubbard ’14 and Austin C. Anderson ’12 won all three matches this weekend. Hubbard won by large margins during the semifinals and finals.
There were some close matches during the finals on Sunday. Second-seeded Michael G. Zomnir ’11 lost 10-12 on the fifth game, and seventh-seeded Joseph E. Lemberg ’11 won 11-9 on the fifth game.
This weekend was the last home game for the seniors of the team. This year, the squash team will be losing four seniors, a third of their team. “We are graduating an almost unprecedented number of seniors this year,” Mazen said. “We’re psyched that the incoming recruits are growing in number and increasing in prior experience each year.”
Hubbard will travel to Dartmouth to compete individually in the College Squash Association Individual Championship this weekend.