Senior Taylor Mahr returns a ball during during DePauw's match against
Sewanee College. DePauw dropped the match 5-4
before beating Skidmore College 6-3. DePauw placed seventh in the
ITA Indoor Championship and is ranked 11th nationally.
SAM CARAVANA / THE DEPAUW.
DePauw University’s women’s tennis team faced three teams over the weekend in the Intercollegiate Tennis Association Division III Team Indoor Championship. At the end DePauw was victorious over Skidmore College, who the team faced last in the competition line up, winning 6-3 and placing the team in seventh place at the conclusion of the tournament. The women, ranked 11th, lost to 12th-ranked University of Chicago, 6-3, and 21-ranked Sewanee, 5-4.
Sophomore Maddie Lee felt that the team had a strong showing.
“We played the best and had the best results when we brought the high energy on and off the court,” Lee said.
This weekend challenged the 14 women, senior Kaitlin Pickrel said.
“It was a test of our ability to overcome adversity because the ITA is a very long, grueling weekend and every team there is a very good team so there is no room to not be performing at our best at all times,” Pickrel said. “As a team it worked well to be mentally prepared to fight for every point and every match because none of them we're handed to us, we really had to earn it.”
In Friday evening’s play against Chicago, seniors Taylor Mahr and Carolyn Huerth picked up a win, 8-6, at third doubles. In singles, senior Kaitlin Pickrel, defeated Chicago’s Courtney Warren 6-2, 6-3 at the fifth spot and Lee came out on top with a 7-6 (7-2), 6-5 win, at sixth singles.
In Chicago’s victory the Maroon took a lead in their season improving to 5-2 overall and walked away in better spirits than after losing to the Tigers last year.
“The win [Friday night] was a very good one for us over a veteran DePauw team that got the better of us twice last year," Chicago Head Coach Jay Tee told Chicago’s athletic department. "I thought we did a real nice job of putting together a game plan and then going out and executing in doubles and then carried that confidence right through to singles.”
Moving into their matches on Mar. 1, the Tigers knew they had to bring their best game and go after every point Lee said.
“We really had to focus on fighting for every ball and staying on our toes,” Lee said. “Some, if not all, of our individual opponents made us think and re-strategize when our original plans weren’t working.”
Facing Sewanee in a match that lasted over six hours, DePauw had four wins after senior duo Julie Wittwer and Kaitlin Pickrel won their match 8-6 and in singles senior Mahr, playing at third, Wittwer, playing at fourth, and Lee, playing at sixth, walked away winners. Despite these wins Sewanee topped the DePauw women by one match to come out on top at 5-4.
When it came time to face Skidmore the DePauw crowd saw a new group of women step onto the court.
“We knew we had to bring up the energy level to pump each other up,” Lee said.
In fact, Lee proved to be an asset to the Tigers over the weekend. She stepped onto the court at 4:00 a.m. against Skidmore to help pull out the win.
“The fact that we were out on the courts that late and still were able to pull out a win against a team that wasn't going to give up goes to show how far we have come mentally and physically,” Pickrel said. “I think that will set us up well for grueling matches in the future.”
DePauw immediately took a 2-1 lead after doubles duo Claire Marshall and Maggie MacPhail, both seniors, held their place at the top spot with an 8-4 victory over Zoe Valella and Yumi Karlshoej. Also picking up another win were Wittwer and Pickrel, 8-5. In singles Marshall defeated Valella 6-0, 6-3 at the first spot and MacPhail also took a victory at 6-2, 6-1 at the second spot.
“Skidmore has a lot of fighters and they raised their game and we were able to take advantage and bring our game on top of that,” DePauw head coach Scott Riggle said.
In addition, Wittwer and Lee won both their matches. At the end of the day the women topped Skidmore 6-3 and learned a lot in the weekend’s play.
“We will be able to draw on it for our matches to come,” Lee said. “We’re definitely going to have to be mentally tougher and determined for every single point. Despite our overall result in this tournament, we proved we can hang with the top teams in the nation which is huge for our confidence taking on the rest of our competition this season.”
The women will face Hope College on Thursday as they continue on in their Spring season.
Said Riggle: “I’m looking forward to seeing that we’re not playing afraid, trusting our shots and we always play hard."