Women’s Tennis dominates season
MIT Women’s Tennis completed a perfect season of play in the New England Women’s and Men’s Athletic Conference today as the Engineers claimed the 2012 NEWMAC Championship with a 5-0 victory over defending champion Wellesley College. In a rematch of last season’s championship match, MIT reversed that decision to win its fourth conference crown and first since 2002. The victory also gave the Engineers the NEWMAC automatic bid to the 2013 NCAA Tournament.
Freshman Victoria Tam who was a part of winning four points in the two matches this weekend, was named the NEWMAC Tournament’s Most Outstanding Player. MIT ran its record to 10-1 for the season, while Wellesley dropped to 8-3.
All of the doubles matches were closely contested, but in the end the Engineers came out on top in all three to take a commanding 3-0 lead in the match. The closest of the three came at No. 2 where the MIT team of senior Candace Wu and Julia C. Hsu ’14 were taken to the limit by the Wellesley team of Erica Choo/Joyce Chen in a 9-8 win for the Engineers. At No. 1, the MIT pairing of Lauren C. Quisenberry ’14 and Tam were pressed as well, but came out on top over the Blue’s Diana Granger/Sojung Lee, 8-6. Providing the final doubles point was the No. 3 team of Michelle M. Dutt ’15 and Sunnie E. Lampl ’16 who edged past Suzanne Barth/Veronica Lin, 8-5.
After teaming up in doubles, it was Quisenberry and Tam who provided the two singles wins to put the championship in the Engineers hands. Playing at No. 1, Quisenberry allowed just one game to her opponent, downing Granger 6-1, 6-0. Tam, who also scored a singles win yesterday in the semifinals, held off Barth in the first set of the No. 4 match and then rolled in the second in a 6-4, 6-0 decision.
With the fall portion of its schedule complete, MIT will return to action on the courts next March as it opens play in the spring portion of its 2012-13 schedule.