Women's tennis wins dual match against MIT

    The women's tennis team captured the first of its two dual matches of the fall season, trouncing previously-unbeaten MIT 7-2 yesterday evening at Vouté Courts.
    The marquee matchup was at No. 1 singles, where Jumbo sophomore Julia Browne and Engineer junior Leslie Hansen met in a rematch of Sunday's ITA Regional championship. Like their first meeting, Browne sailed past Hansen, the eighth-ranked singles player in the nation, this time by a 6-1, 6-3 score.
    Tufts went on to win five of the six singles matches. Freshmen Jen Lavet, Jen LaCara and Nathalie Schiles carried the bottom half of the lineup, each taking straight set victories over their respective MIT opponents. The trio, playing collegiate singles for the first time, combined to lose only 15 games.
    The most exciting match of the evening was a two-and-a-half-hour marathon at third singles between sophomore Edwina Stewart of Tufts and sophomore Melissa Diskin of MIT. After splitting the first two sets, Stewart and Diskin played deep into a back-and-forth third-set tiebreak. Stewart, who never played higher than fifth singles last season, eventually took the tiebreak, 19-17.
    Both of Tufts' two setbacks came courtesy of Engineers freshman Anastasia Vishnevetsky. At first doubles, the first-year combined with Hansen to defeat the Jumbos' tandem of Browne and Stewart — who were a perfect 10-0 in doubles play last season — 9-7. Vishnevetsky went on to score the biggest upset of the day, topping junior captain Meghan McCooey 6-3, 6-0 at second singles.
    See TuftsDaily.com for further coverage.