ORLANDO, Fla. – No. 35 Wellesley College tennis collected its third ranked win of the season in a 6-1 match against No. 37 Hope College at the USTA National Campus on Wednesday afternoon. The Blue (8-1) extended its winning streak to four while the Flying Dutch fell to 6-3 on the year.
Wellesley took No. 1 and 3 doubles in order to go into singles with a 1-0 advantage. Sophomores Lily Cade (Minneapolis, Minn.) and Kriti Sarav (Chicago, Ill.) improved to 5-0 as a pair with a 6-2 victory over junior Mallory Matthews (Midland, Mich.) and sophomore Phoebe Walker (Traverse City, Mich.) at No. 3 to get the Blue started.
The Flying Dutch struck back at No. 2 doubles with senior Miyako Coffey (Cedar Rapids, Iowa) and first year Hadley Krygier (White Lake, Mich.) topping junior Emilee Pak (Chicago, Ill.) and sophomore Suzanne Xu (Boyds, Md.), 6-2.
It all came down to No. 1 doubles. At 4-4, Blue first years Kotistha Modak (Chennai, India) and Sofia Corte-Real (Stamford, Conn.) earned a critical break versus senior Sullivan Moran (Birmingham, Mich.) and junior Amanda Lopykinski (Lemont, Ill.). Modak then held for the match, 6-4, to nab the doubles point for Wellesley.
In singles, first year Sophie Buttorff (Tacoma, Wash.) was in control at No. 4 for the Blue, convincingly breezing through Coffey, 6-1, 6-1. Sarav followed close behind with a one-sided 6-2, 6-0 point over Walker at No. 6 to get Wellesley with a point of the win.
Xu earned the match clinching point for the Blue at No. 2 singles. The sophomore took down Krygier, 6-2, 7-5, earning a fourth consecutive singles win.
Corte-Real kept the scoring going for Wellesley, making the most of the opportunities to topple Moran, 6-3, 6-4 at No. 3.
Wellesley first year Nandini Patel (Phoenix, Ariz.) also erased a set deficit at No. 5 versus sophomore Madison Wei (Parker, Colo.). Wei initially claimed a 6-4 opener before Patel came alive in the second set tiebreaker 7-6(0) to even the match at a set apiece. It was Patel who ultimately came up victorious, winning the match tiebreaker 10-7 to grow the lead to 6-0.
Finally, Modak recovered after dropping the opening set to Lopykinski, 6-4 at the No. 1 spot. Wellesley's first year cracked the power up in the second, shutting out Hope 6-0 to force a one-set showdown. It would ultimately be Hope coming away with the 6-4 finale to grab a lone point.
Wellesley will wrap up its Orlando trip on Friday, March 21 with a 12:00 PM match with George Fox University. Hope will take on Wesleyan University in Orlando at 5:00 PM that same day.
