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Princeton University Athletics
Players Mentioned
National Championship Rematch Highlights Squash Showdowns With Penn Wednesday
January 27, 2009 | Men's Squash
Following an extended break after the final match of the 2008 portion of the season, both the Princeton men's and women's squash teams will take the court tonight with hopes of keeping their perfect Ivy League records intact.
The highlight match of the evening will come at 5:30, when the No. 1 Princeton women face the No. 2 Penn Quakers in a rematch of the exciting 2008 Howe Cup national final. Princeton rallied from an early 2-1 deficit to defeat the Quakers for its second straight national team title. Penn had won the regular season meeting 5-4 in a thriller in Philadelphia; that match helped push the Quakers to the Ivy League title.
While both teams enter tonight's showdown undefeated, Penn has played the far tougher schedule. The Quakers defeated No. 5 Yale 5-4 early in the season, and they followed it up with a 5-4 victory over Trinity last Saturday. Three close wins for Sydney Scott at No. 2 and a 3-1 victory for Emily Goodwin helped key the victory for the Quakers. Princeton has yet to lose an individual match this season, and junior Emery Maine is coming off an impressive victory at the 2009 Constable Invitational.
The match will feature several key players from last year's pair of thrillers. You can read about Penn's 5-4 win here and Princeton's 6-3 national championship win here.
The men's match features No. 2 Princeton and No. 7 Penn; the Quakers' three losses this season have come to No. 1 Trinity, No. 3 Yale and No. 4 Cornell. Of that group, Princeton has played only Cornell and came away with a 9-0 home win. Princeton has won three straight Ivy League titles; no Tiger men's team has ever won four straight league crowns. Led by senior trio Mauricio Sanchez, Kimlee Wong and Hesham El Halaby, the Tigers have not lost an Ivy League match since 2006.
Penn comes into the match having won four of five, including an 8-1 victory over Brown.