Women's Squash Posts Second 5-4 Win In Four Days, Tops Yale In New Haven To Stay Perfect

Sunday, January 13

New Haven, Conn.

12:00 PM

Princeton University

Yale

Photo by: Steven Hirshberg

Women's Squash Posts Second 5-4 Win In Four Days, Tops Yale In New Haven To Stay Perfect

January 13, 2019 | Women's Squash

For the second time this week, the Princeton women's squash team showed poise under pressure against a highly ranked opponent and came away with a victory to remain undefeated on the season.

A critical comeback by Grace Doyle — who was featured in the latest episode of Beyond The Stripes — led Princeton to a 5-4 road win over sixth-ranked Yale Sunday afternoon in the Tigers' final match before the exam break.

Princeton got 3-0 wins from Samantha Chai, Andrea Toth and Izzy Hirshberg, as well as a four-game win from Emme Leonard, to move to 9-0 on the season and 2-0 in the Ivy League.

"Today was a tough match and it took a full team effort," Hirshberg said. "The last players had to dig deep to pull off the win. Yale is a great team who was ready to play us on their home courts. It's exciting to be 9-0 as we move forward to the most challenging part of the season taking on the remaining Ivies and then the Howe Cup."

Doyle's win was the most dramatic of the day for Princeton. After going down 2-0 to Aishwarya Battacharya, Doyle posted a tight 11-9 win, and then back-to-back 11-8 victories to take the match. Leonard also split her first two games, but she scored 11-8 and 11-3 wins to take the match.

"Before attending Princeton, Riya and I had been training partners throughout high school," Leonard said. "Riya is a great competitor and I knew our match would be a battle. Riya fights for every point, but I was happy that I stuck with my game plan helping earn the 5-4 win over the Bulldogs. It was a great end to a busy weekend, and we are all very excited to take on Penn, Harvard, and Dartmouth in the next couple of weeks."

"I had a tough match today but managed to play a solid match and won in three," Toth said. "Our team knew going into today that Yale was going to come out fighting hard and we would all have tough matches. It was a really close 5-4 match but fortunately we pulled out a win. We all fought hard and I am incredibly proud of our team."

Princeton will return to the court Jan. 30 in a home match against Penn, and then will take on #1 Harvard Feb. 2 at 2:30 in Jadwin.

"So proud of the team's performance today," head coach Gail Ramsay said. "Yale put out a great display of squash and we needed to be focused and determined. We worked through a huge deficit, 2-0 down with Gracie Doyle who worked back to win the fifth. That turned out to be one of the key wins. It was also good to see Izzy Hirshberg come through with a 3-0 win as well with Sam Chai, their veteran play really showed through. Toth at number 7 controlled her opponent with good depth and aggressive front court attack. I was impressed with her calm, determined court demeanor. The final match fell onto Emme Leonard's match at number 6. Emme had to fight hard to neutralize her opponent who was stead and made few errors. It was great to see Emme pull out her match pushing us to five wins."

PRINCETON 5, YALE 4
1 – Lucy Beecroft (Y) d. Bubble Lui 2, (7), 3, (8), 8
2 – Helen Teegan (Y) d. Raneem El-Torky 4, 3, (8), (8), 4
3 – Celine Yeap (Y) d. Elle Ruggiero 3, 9, (9), 9
4 – Grace Doyle (P) d. Aishwarya Battacharya (8), (3), 9, 8, 8
5 – Samantha Chai (P) d. Emily Sherwood 9, 9, 9
6 – Emme Leonard (P) d. Riya Mital 12, (9), 8, 3
7 – Andrea Toth (P) d. Alexis Lazor 8, 8, 3
8 – Nikita Joshi (Y) d. Morgan Steelman 9, (9), 6, (6), 4
9 – Izzy Hirshberg (P) d. Jessica Yacobucci 10, 4, 3