By Dustin Waleff, Staff Writer
Susquehanna’s women’s tennis team fell 5-4 in their match on Oct. 5 against the Misericordia Cougars at the Garrett Tennis Courts in Selinsgrove, Pa.
It was a heartbreaking ending to the fall portion of the schedule for the team as they fell to a season record of 1-4.
With the match tied 4-4, senior Amy Jennings started off the decisive singles match with a hard-fought 7-6 win in the first set. Following, Misericordia’s sophomore Cassidy Breen stormed back to take the final two sets of the match to defeat Jennings 6-7, 6-3 and 6-1 to give the Cougars a 5-4 win over the River Hawks.
However, the beginning of the match displayed a fast start for the River Hawks as they were able to win two of the three doubles matches to take the lead heading into singles play.
At first doubles, the dominant duo of sophomores Ashlynn Searer and Anna Ream used another strong performance to pick up the River Hawks’ first win of the match 8-5.
In second doubles, it was a tough matchup for the duo of Jennings and her freshman partner Leanne Vanessendelft, as they fell 8-3 to the Cougars strong duo of Breen and sophomore Allie Woodward.
The duo tasked with playing third doubles were juniors Nicole Brintzenhoff and Kallie Honstine, who gave the River Hawks momentum heading into the singles matches.
In their doubles match, Honstine and Brintzenhoff held off the Cougars duo as they were able to record an 8-6 victory.
“Nicole and I went into the match after practicing together once,” Honstine said.
“We both have different skills that we brought out on to the court during [the] match. I would consider myself to be an aggressive net player. Nicole can really control the back-service line of the court. Putting those two types of players together as a pair just really complimented each other.”
“While playing yesterday we kept saying ‘one point at a time.’ We didn’t focus on the past points or how we would play further into the match but more on what we were doing in the moment and making sure to execute the play properly,” Honstine continued.
Though the duo had never played a match together, they were able to overcome that lack of familiarity of each other with a strong performance.
“Teamwork and good communication really worked in our favor,” Brintzenhoff said.
“We constantly encouraged each other through mistakes and con- gratulated good shots. Kallie has some amazing net play capabilities, so I made sure to feed her the ball while she was up at net. I shoot for tough-to-return angles, so she set me up to hit tight angles as much as possible.”
“We knew each other’s strengths and weaknesses, capitalized on and covered for them, and in the end it paid off with a win,” Brintzenhoff continued.
Searer was able to extend the River Hawks lead with a victory in straight sets at first singles 6-1, 6-1.
Following Searer’s second win of the day, Misericordia responded, winning the next three matches to give the Cougars a 4-3 lead with two matches left to play.
Freshman Grace Tepes, who came into the match after picking up her first win of the season against Alvernia, knotted the match up at 4-4 with a strong performance to defeat her opponent in straight sets 6-3 and 7-5, which improved her individual record to 2-0 on the season.
“I went into both matches knowing that anything could happen and that I needed to focus on my shots,” Tepes said. “I didn’t really carry anything over because every team is different, and I just tried to help do my part of the match.”
In second doubles, it was a tough matchup for the duo of Jennings and Vanessendelft, as they fell 8-3 to the Cougars strong duo of Breen and Woodward.
The River Hawks will next travel to Williamsport, Pa. to finish off their fall season and take on the Penn College Wildcats at 12 p.m. on Oct. 12. Susquehanna is undefeated all time against Penn College with four wins.