Princeton University Athletics
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Top-Seeded Women's Squash Prepares For 2009 Howe Cup Championship
February 12, 2009 | Women's Squash
With its second Ivy League trophy in three seasons currently residing in head coach Gail Ramsay's office, the top-ranked Princeton women's squash team is making the trip north to Boston for the 2009 Howe Cup championship, which determines the team national champion. The Tigers have claimed the title each of the last two years and will hold the top seed when Friday's competition begins.
The CSA national championships bring most of the women's squash programs in the nation together for one final team competition. It is broken down into different eight-team tournaments, including the Howe Cup (A-Division). Princeton will begin its journey Friday at 5 p.m. in a quarterfinal showdown with Williams (courts 4, 5 and glass); the Tigers handed Williams a 9-0 defeat in December and won all 27 games, including 14 by 9-0 scores.
If Princeton wins, it will take on the winner of the premier match Friday between No. 5 Yale and No. 4 Trinity. The Bantams defeated Yale 5-4 at home earlier in the season and held a 4-2 advantage in matches that will be repeated in the quarterfinal round. (Teams had to declare their lineups prior to the weekend and can be found here.) Princeton defeated Yale 8-1 already this season, while it did not play Trinity; in fact, the last time these teams met, the Bantams claimed a 5-4 home victory over Princeton prior to the 2008 team championships.
The semifinal match will take place Saturday at 2 p.m., also on courts 4, 5 and the glass court. That match will follow the first semifinal, which, if form holds, will feature a rematch between No. 2 Harvard and No. 3 Penn. The Crimson traveled down to Philadelphia and came away with a 7-2 victory over the 2008 Ivy champions. While Penn will use the same lineup as it did last weekend, Harvard switched its 1 and 2, as well as its 3 and 4. Of those four matches, the Crimson went 3-1 against Penn.
This will be the second time in three years that Penn and Harvard will meet in a national semifinal, and the Quakers will be looking to return the favor from 2007, when Penn was the second seed and held a regular-season win over Harvard, only to watch the Crimson pull out a victory and eventually fall 6-3 to Princeton in the final.
If Princeton does reach Sunday's national championship match (2 p.m., courts 4, 5, glass), it will see a team it has already beaten. While No. 6 Cornell and No. 7 Stanford have dreams of crashing the party, the more likely opponents are Harvard and Penn. Princeton defeated Harvard last Sunday 5-4 at home to clinch the Ivy League championship. In that match, Princeton won at spots 1, 2, 3, 6 and 9 and lost five-game matches at the other four positions. The Crimson will send out different players at the top four spots, so that could affect those matches, but Tiger head coach Gail Ramsay is hopeful one of her losing players from Sunday will bounce back with a bigger effort.
Should Penn reach the final, it would be a rematch of the 2008 title match, which Princeton rallied to win 6-3. The top eight matches would all be the same as the regular season showdown, a 6-3 Princeton win; the Tigers held a 5-3 edge in those contests. Only the No. 9 match would be different, and in the regular season, Penn's Emily Goodwin was forced to retire from that match due to injury.
Below is Princeton's lineup for the 2009 Howe Cup, along with season record and highlights. Should somebody become injured, senior tri-captain Joanna Scoon is currently in the 10th spot and would move into the lineup.
1) Amanda Siebert (8-2) - swept last weekend against Dartmouth and Harvard; one of two players to take a game off Penn's Kristen Lange, a 2008 individual finalist; 2008 Constable champion and 2009 finalist.
2) Neha Kumar (3-1) - overcame injury-riddled season to rally past Harvard's Nirasha Guruge in five games for critical win in Ivy-clinching match; only loss of the season came against Penn and held a 7-1 lead in fifth game before falling; 2007 national individual semifinalist.
3) Emery Maine (9-0) - one of two Princeton starters without a loss on the season; rallied from 0-2 deficit in early-season win over Cornell; 2009 Constable champion; won clinching match in 2008 national championship win over Penn.
4) Kaitlin Sennatt (7-2) - won 10-8 in fifth game against Penn to give Princeton a 3-2 team lead; lost Harvard match in five games; lost only one match in first two dual-meet seasons and has never lost a Howe Cup match.
5) Jackie Moss (7-1) - won first seven matches before letting 2-1 lead slip away against Harvard; split first two games against Penn before taking 9-5 and 9-3 wins; didn't allow a single point in victory over Yale; won 2008 Howe Cup semifinal match with 10-8 win in fifth game.
6) Maggie O'Toole (7-2) - 2009 tri-captain; one of two losses on season came by injury default after getting hit; trailed 1-0 against Harvard before winning final three games ... swept all three matches in first Howe Cup last year.
7) Aly Brady (7-2) - 2009 tri-captain; gave Princeton 4-2 lead against Penn with 3-1 win; won final six points to rally for fourth-game victory over the Quakers ... swept three games in victory over Yale.
8) Nikki Sequeira (9-1) - won first nine matches in her first full year of varsity; only loss came after leading 2-0 against Harvard; lost only three points during Penn match for Princeton's most decisive victory of the night.
9) Katherine Giovinazzo (10-0) - only freshman in the starting lineup; winningest player for Princeton this season; enters the Howe Cup having won 26 straight games and has won 27 of 28 overall, including 19 by either 9-0 or 9-1 scores.