ITHACA, N.Y. — The women's tennis team will wrap up its regular season over the weekend at Reis Tennis Center, looking to play spoiler against Harvard at noon Saturday before taking on Dartmouth at noon Sunday on Senior Day.
Cornell (6-14, 0-5 Ivy League) is coming off a pair of losses to Penn and Ivy League-leading Princeton last weekend. The Big Red shuffled its doubles lineup to pair freshmen
Valerie Ho and
Katherine Nguyen together at No. 1, and the duo was toe-to-toe and on serve against the nationally-ranked tandem from Penn when the match was halted.
Ho leads the team with a 10-6 record in in singles, having moved up to the No. 2 position last weekend for the first time (though neither of those matches reached completion). She's typically joined in the top half of the order by senior
Mariko Iinuma (5-12) and Nguyen (5-14).
Harvard (16-6, 4-1) remains in the Ivy League hunt after a pair of 4-3 victories last weekend against Yale and Brown. The Crimson has won eight of its last nine matches, anchored by Erica Oosterhout (10-7) at the No. 1 singles position. While outside the national rankings, she ranks third-highest in the Ivy League using the Intercollegiate Tennis Association's ranking system. She also teams with Natasha Gonzalez (6-4) to form Harvard's No. 1 doubles entry. Jenna Friedel is 14-1 from primarily No. 2, and Irene Lu has won five straight at No. 6.
Harvard holds a 39-5 lead in the all-time series, but Cornell has won three of the last six meetings between the programs. The Crimson won the most recent match, a 4-1 decision on the final day of the ECAC Indoor Championships on Feb. 10.
Dartmouth (3-16, 0-5) enters the weekend having lost 12 consecutive matches since topping Cornell, 4-1, in the consolation semifinals of the ECAC Indoor Championships on Feb. 9. The Big Green typically gets the major of its singles points from the bottom spots in the order, though Racquel Lyn (3-14) and Abigail Chiu (4-11) both won their respective matches from the top two positions against Brown last weekend. They also team up to comprise the No. 1 doubles pairing.
The Big Red is 7-30 all-time against the Big Green, though five of the last eight Ivy League matches have ended in a 4-3 score. Cornell's last victory against the Big Green came in 2013 at Reis Tennis Center.
Sunday's match will also serve as Senior Day, commemorating the final collegiate match of Iinuma, the team's captain and lone senior. Both matches are open to the public and free to attend.
