Women's Tennis Stuns No. 11 Clemson

Just three matches into the Harvard women’s tennis team’s contest against 11th-ranked Clemson this weekend, things were looking somewhat bleak. After losing the doubles point and two quick singles matches, the Crimson was just one point away from a loss, on the road, against a top-15 opponent.

Harvard (6-2) fought back, however, rattling off four straight wins to take a stunning upset of Clemson (7-2). With three of the Crimson’s top four singles players battling back from first set losses to earn must-win victories, Harvard managed to pull off a comeback in every sense of the word.

“I’m on cloud nine,” freshman June Lee said. “I’m so happy right now. It’s very encouraging and motivating. Now that we’ve beaten such a highly-ranked school, we know our capability and what we can do, and it’s amazing.”

With the Crimson down 3-0 and struggling early in the remaining singles matches, it was Lee who managed to turn the momentum in Harvard’s favor. The freshman easily dispatched Clemson’s Romy Koelzer, currently ranked 54th in the nation, in a 6-2, 6-4 match to give the Crimson their first win on the day.

“The girl I played, she liked to hit really flat,” Lee said. “I knew that if I kept mixing it up, like if I hit two high balls and then two flat balls, or two angles and kept the rallies longer, she would miss or get frustrated. And she was very frustrated, she was missing a lot, and I just stayed positive and worked each point.”

The focus then fell to the three singles matches still in progress, where freshmen Spencer Liang and Monica Lin, and sophomore Amy He were all forced to battle back from dropping the first set at first, second, and fourth singles, respectively.

Down 5-3 in the second set of her contest, Liang was the first to add another tally to Harvard’s total. The freshman ace stayed calm to force and then win a tiebreaker in the second set, and then quickly regained her form after dropping the first two games of the third set to win the match with a 6-2 victory in the final frame.

“We were all feeling the pressure,” Liang said. “I of course felt pressure in my match because if one of us didn’t perform and just embrace the pressure, then we would have lost the match. But we all handled it really well, and I think that coming back just shows a lot about all of our characters.”

Monica Lin kept the Crimson’s comeback attempt going, earning her own 2-6, 7-6, 6-4 win in the second spot to even the match up at 3-all with just one match still in progress. All eyes then turned to court four, as He and Clemson sophomore Yuilynn Miao fought to earn the deciding point. He rose to the challenge, taking the second and third sets easily to give Harvard the final tally.

“Amy did so great,” Liang said. “Even though she also didn’t come out playing as well as she’d like, she stepped up her game and let loose. [Miao] was tough, she was very consistent, she was hitting balls all over the court, but Amy just stayed patient and she kept playing her game….She stepped in and kept being aggressive.”

The Crimson gave Clemson a run for their money early in the doubles matches but was unable to come away with the point. Harvard’s No. 2 team of Lee and junior Sylvia Li dropped a quick match in an 8-1 decision, but He and sophomore Amanda Lin came out on top of a back-and-forth contest at third doubles to knot the score up at 1-1. At first doubles, Liang and Monica Lin dropped an 8-5 match to give Clemson the doubles point.

—Staff writer Glynis K. Healey can be reached at ghealey@college.harvard.edu.