Women's Tennis Takes One of Three Matches Over First Weekend Home Series

In its first home matches of the fall season, the Harvard women’s tennis team faced three competitors: Boston University, Boston College, and Ivy League rival Yale. After claiming a close victory in the first match of the weekend against the Terriers on Friday at the Beren Tennis Center, the Crimson was unable to best either of its weekend opponents, resulting in a 1-2 weekend performance.

Facing injuries and illnesses among a few of the squad’s returning players from a year ago, Harvard thrust its rookies into the lineup, as Nika Besker, Natasha Gonzalez, Irene Lu, Lexi Milunovich, and Kaelli Thiel all played impactful roles throughout the weekend in both singles and doubles. With the group playing in its first home match for the Crimson, the experience gave it exposure to greater challenges and opportunities than junior tennis had to offer.

“Although we weren't as strong as we could be due some of last year’s starters being injured, it gave several freshmen the opportunity to play and work with the coaches on court,” Milunovich said. “This is a change from junior tennis when you can't receive coaching unless you split sets and for only 10 minutes. Coach Traci [Green]’s advice helped me clinch the second set and win my match against Yale.”

In the match against BU, the team kicked off the doubles events on strong footing, winning three of the four events in the category. The competition was much tighter in the singles matches, however, as the group of co-captain June Lee, sophomore Isabel Jasper, Besker, Gonzalez, Milunovich, and Thiel went 3-3, allowing Harvard to clinch a narrow victory through the doubles tiebreaker.

Lee provided the decisive victory in the match at the No. 1 position as the afternoon sun faded to darkness in the final matchup of the day. After losing the first set, 7-6, against Terrier junior Iryna Kostriko, she pulled even with her own victory, 7-6, in the second set and used that momentum to carry her to a 10-8 win in the third set tiebreaker. Had Lee lost, the Terriers would have claimed the match win for themselves.

“We had a strong showing against Boston University in our opening match,” Milunovich said. “June [Lee]...was the last match playing. It was a thriller under the lights as she came back from down a set and down, 5-2, to win the second set in a tiebreaker and then win the deciding tiebreaker after they split.”

The Crimson’s other Boston competitor, Boston College, proved to be a much greater test on Sunday, as Harvard went winless in doubles. In the singles portion of the event, sophomore Erica Oosterhout was the only Crimson competitor to claim victory, as she bested No. 103 ranked Lexi Boor of Boston College in two sets, 7-5, 6-3.

Harvard fared similarly in its match against Saturday against Yale, winning two of the six singles matches, while again failing to claim victory in doubles. Lu and Milunovich produced the two successful outings for the Crimson, both having fought back from first set losses only to win in three. Gonzalez nearly completed her own come from behind victory against her Yale counterpart, Amy Yang, but ultimately faded in a hard fought third set.

“Yale is always a tough matchup,” junior Nikki Kallenberg said. “It was a great opportunity to see some of their cards going into the Yale Invite in two weeks and of course for Ivy season in the spring.”

Overall, the team will treat this weekend as a platform to build off of, as they look forward to the challenges ahead in remainder of Harvard’s fall and spring matchups.

“Since this is one of our first matches of the season, we definitely still have to get into the rhythm of match play,” Kallenberg said. “With seven freshmen adjusting to college tennis from juniors, the fall will be a great time for them to prepare before the spring.”

—Staff writer Jackson M. Reynolds can be reached at jackson.reynolds@thecrimson.com