Women's Tennis Splits Weekend Road Matches

This weekend, the Harvard women’s tennis team took a trip to the nation’s capital for two road matches. The team split the contests, with the No. 46 Crimson falling to No. 67 Maryland, 5-2, in College Park on Saturday before beating George Washington on Sunday. The team was led by freshman Nikki Kallenberg. The Naples, Fla. native, playing from the first singles spot on both days, was the only Harvard player to pick up two singles victories on the weekend.

“Niki’s been playing amazing the last few weeks,” coach Traci Green said. “She’s been putting a lot of beautiful points and patterns together. We’re proud of her progress and are looking for more great things from her. She’s still a freshman so she’s still growing, but so far she’s been a gem for us.”

HARVARD 4, GEORGE WASHINGTON 0

Harvard came into Sunday’s contest with George Washington looking to end a three-match losing streak going into its first weekend of the spring season. Fueled by three convincing singles victories and a sweep in the doubles matches, the Crimson (5-4) was able to return to Cambridge above .500 after defeating the Colonials (4-3).

“Our team was very aware that the match [Saturday] could have gone either way,” Green said. “We got some rest, recharged, and came out ready to go.”

Kallenberg picked up a win in the day’s top singles match with a victory over GW freshman Teodora Radosavljevic. Junior Amanda Lin and captain Sylvia Li won from the fifth and sixth singles positions, respectively.

In doubles action, Harvard took all three contests. Sophomore Monica Lin and freshman Ellen Jang-Millsten took first doubles, junior Amy He and Kallenberg were victorious from No. 2, and Li and Amanda Lin made it a sweep from the third spot.

MARYLAND 5, HARVARD 2

The Crimson continued its challenging nonconference schedule by opening the weekend against Maryland. For Harvard, the match was the first for the team since road losses to two top-ten teams in Cal and Stanford last weekend, while the Terrapins (4-4) were coming off a 4-1 road victory over St. John’s.

After dropping her first set, 6-1, Kallenberg stormed back to take the next two to pick up a win for the Crimson. The 1-6, 6-4, 6-3 victory was the first-year’s second victory of the season playing from the first singles position in sophomore June Lee’s absence.

Harvard was also able to pick up a victory in the second singles position after Monica Lin bested Maryland freshman Ekaterina Tour in a closely fought, 7-6, 6-7, 10-5 marathon match. However, the Crimson was unable to pick up the all-important doubles point or a victory in the day’s other four singles matches.

“They were a good team, they were really nitty-gritty, really feisty,” Lee said. “They fought really hard and I mean so did we, we were right there. But, they executed well and we definitely learned from it.”

He also had her match come down to the wire, but with a different result than Lin’s. Harvard’s fifth singles player took the first set, 6-3, before dropping the second, 5-7, and the tiebreaker, 10-6.

Freshman Annika Ringblom, playing third singles, lost both of her sets, 6-2, while Li, playing from six, fell in consecutive 6-3 contests. Jang-Millsten rounded out the top six with a 6-4, 6-3 loss to Terrapins senior Welma Luus.

The doubles point came down to two tiebreakers, but Maryland ultimately ended up on top as Monica Lin and Jang-Millsten lost in first doubles while the freshman duo of Ringblom and Kallenberg fell at the second spot.

The doubles point has been a predictor of success for the Crimson this season. The team is 5-0 in matches when it has won at least two of the three doubles matches and 0-4 when it has not.

“I think we’re definitely going to do a lot of doubles [work this week] because the doubles point is really important,” Lee said. “Being ahead that one point makes a big difference.”