Day 1 at NYS Division III Championships
Friday's results
Ithaca College is hosting the NYS Division III Championships.
The Elmira College women's tennis team put together one of the program's best performances on day one of the New York State Women's Tennis Championships, with four women advancing to at least the quarterfinals of their respective singles draws and two doubles teams advancing to the quarterfinals of their respective doubles draws.
With 10 courts to utilize during the tournament, EC's first, second, and third singles players,
Kimberly Salkin '18,
Ayaka Yoshino '16, and
Amy Schmidt '15, all took the court for their opening round matches first thing Friday morning. Salkin took on Elizabeth McGrail from RIT, Yoshino, for the third time in three weeks, matched up with Nazareth College's Ami Petosa, and Schmidt went up against Emma Jackson from Alfred University.
Salkin dropped the first set of her match, 6-3, but rebounded with a 6-2 second set victory forcing a deciding third set super-tiebreaker. The rookie talent won the super tiebreaker, 10-6, to advance into the quarterfinals. There, she met the two seed Madie Benn from Skidmore College. Salkin went shot-for-shot with Benn, but Benn came out on top, knocking-out Salkin with a 6-2, 6-0 win.
Yoshino found that it is never easy to defeat a person three times in one season as she was on serve with Petosa for the entire first set, resulting in a tiebreaker. Yoshino took advantage of a mini-break in the tiebreaker to take a 4-2 lead, and eventually won the first set after pulling away for a 7-5 win in the tiebreak. The second set was nearly as tight as the first, but Yoshino finished her straight-set victory with a 6-3 result in the second set. Yoshino also drew a tough assignment in the quarterfinals, going up against the number one seed, Brianna Greene, from Skidmore. The third-year standout would fall to Greene, 6-0, 6-2, ending her run in singles.
Schmidt breezed through her first round matchup, taking down Jackson, 6-1, 6-0. Then, similar to her teammates, Schmidt went up against a Skidmore player in the quarterfinals in Zoey Valella. Valella would end Schmidt's run at the championships with a 6-3, 6-1 win.
Kayla Fitzgerald '15 earned a bye into the quarterfinals of the fourth singles draw and found herself up against Alfred's Emily Eisenberg. Fitzgerald got off to a slow start, falling behind 2-1 after an early break of serve, however, she recovered to take the first set 6-4. The second set was a bit easier for the fourth-year player as she would advance to the semifinals after a 6-2 second set. With the win, Fitzgerald advanced to the semifinals which will take place Saturday afternoon.
EC was also successful in the one round of doubles played on Friday, as two of Elmira's three doubles teams advanced to play in the quarterfinals on Saturday.
Schmidt and
Rebecca Zeuschner '18 went up against RIT's second doubles team in their opening round and found themselves in a deep hole early on, falling behind 5-1. EC rallied to cut it to a 7-6 match with Zeuschner serving to tie it up. The Purple and Gold fought off five match points in the service game, coming up with a number of crucial shots, and eventually held to tie the match at seven. With the momentum on their side, Schmidt and Zeuschner won the next two games, closing out the 9-7 win.
Also picking up an opening round win were the Fitzgerald sisters, Kayla and
Megan Fitzgerald '18, in the third doubles bracket. The Fitzgeralds took on the third doubles team from Nazareth and suffered an early break, falling behind 2-0 to the Golden Flyers. It was all EC from that point on, however, as the Purple and Gold won the next eight games for the 8-2 victory.
Nazareth sophomore
Audrey Knorr won her first-round match at fifth singles with a 6-2, 2-6, 14-12 victory over Taylor Ferrari of William Smith. Knorr lost in the quarterfinals to Rensselaer's Pooja Ganesh by the scores of 6-0, 6-0. At fourth singles, senior
Adrienne Sharza pushed William Smith's Alex Cattie to three sets, eventually falling 6-2, 5-7, 10-4.
Sophomore
Jean McCarthy played William Smith's Hannah More at first singles and fell 6-4, 6-0. At second singles, junior
Ami Petosa fell to Elmira's Ayaka Yashino 7-6, 6-3, and senior
Elizabeth Crane fell to RIT's Diane Wang at third singles by the score of 6-3, 6-0. Sophomore
Carlee Hastings played sixth singles and fell to NYU's Jazmin Colling 6-2, 6-0.
Crane and Knorr played together at third doubles against Elmira's tandem of Kaylee Fitzgerald and Megan Fitzgerald. Crane and Knorr fell 8-2 in the match.
Freshman Callie Clapper
got Alfred's lone singles win, defeating her first-round opponent from Ithaca, 6-3, 7-5 on Friday. Later that day, in the quarterfinals, Clapper fell to Vassar's Courtney Geiss, 6-1, 6-1.
Alfred's other five singles players lost in the first round, and AU dropped all three first-round doubles matches.