Sophomore Julia Browne and junior captain Meghan McCooey weren't initially invited to the party, but they sure had fun crashing it.
The women's tennis team's tandem captured the ITA National Small College Div. III crown Friday afternoon in Mobile, Ala., downing Denison's second-seeded duo of sophomore Kristin Cobb and junior Marta Drane in the finals 6-2, 6-2. Along their way to the title, Browne and McCooey also knocked off the No. 1 seed, junior Lauren Caire and senior Katie Tabb of Washington and Lee, in the first round, and the third seed, senior Molly Fiala and junior Andrea Schupbach of Coe College, in the semifinals.
"We just had such an incredible fall season together, and this really just added something special to it," Browne said. "We knew we wanted to make the most of our opportunity, and we definitely did that. We played by far the best we've ever played doubles together or separately. It was just incredible."
At the veritable who's who of the top duos in the nation, Browne and McCooey represented easily one of the most inexperienced combinations in the field. While the two Jumbos were paired for the first time at the start of the 2008 fall season, all three of their opponents played together for nearly all of last year, usually to great success. The nationally ranked No. 5 duo of Cobb and Drane was the runner-up at the NCAA Championships last spring, while the fourth-ranked team of Caire and Tabb was a quarterfinalist at the same event. Fiala and Schupbach, meanwhile, entered this season as the No. 21-ranked doubles combination in Div. III.
"I didn't know who was ranked what in the nation and I just tried not to think about that, and I know Julia also just focused on the doubles we've been playing," McCooey said. "We knew we had every reason to be confident that we could beat the teams no matter what they were ranked or what they had done last year. At the same time, we knew they were really strong and that we would have to work hard to earn it."
Browne and McCooey were very nearly picked off in the first round, as Caire and Tabb were serving for the match up 5-4 in the second set. But the Jumbos responded and changed the course of the match, breaking the Generals' serve before claiming the set 7-5. Tufts then took the third set super-tiebreaker 10-5 to complete the upset.
"When we first started playing in the first set, we were both a little nervous and we were letting them take control of the match," Browne said. "But we knew that when we took the second set that we were going to win that match because we took all the momentum. We were moving forward on our shots and taking more risks, and that was the only way we were going to beat them. We weren't going to beat them playing carefully because they're a really, really tough team. We really went for everything and didn't really think about anything and what anything meant."
From there, Browne and McCooey sailed through a semifinal showdown with Fiala and Schupbach 6-2, 7-5. That win set up a meeting with Cobb and Drane in the championship match, in which Browne and McCooey dropped just four games.
"I don't think the score was very indicative of what happened during the match," McCooey said. "That was definitely the best match that Julia and I played together the whole tournament. We kept reminding ourselves that we had to go after it and take it from them because they weren't going to give it to us, and that's what we did. We were able to go through the whole match without having any lapses."
Invitations to the event were originally only extended to the winners of the eight ITA regional tournaments held throughout the country at the end of September. As a result, Browne and McCooey, who lost in the finals of the New England Championships on Sept. 28, were not initially scheduled to make the trip to Alabama. But when the winning Williams tandem of senior co-captain Cary Gibson and sophomore Nikki Reich declined to attend, the runner-up Tufts pair scored the region's bid to the tournament.
As the winner of the New England singles tournament, Browne also participated in the weekend's singles draw, coming away with a fourth-place finish. Seeded first entering the tournament, Browne came away with a challenging 6-4, 1-6, 6-4 win over freshman Kalla Schaefer of Wisconsin-Whitewater in the first round.
But Browne had more trouble in her showdown against another first year, third-seeded Jennifer Kung of the University of Chicago. After they split the first two sets, Kung took control in the decisive third set, winning the two-hour semifinals marathon 7-5, 4-6, 6-4 and dealing Browne her first loss at singles all season.
"It was an unbelievable match," Browne said. "I give all the credit to my opponent. I definitely didn't give it away to her -- she took it from me, so great job to her. I didn't play the best tennis I could've played, but I gave it everything I had, and I'm extremely happy to come home having won the doubles."
Browne then went on to lose the third-place match to Chapman sophomore and second seed Liz Lewis 6-2, 6-4.
This weekend signaled the end of the fall season for Browne and McCooey, as well as the rest of the women's tennis team, which competed at the New England Women's Intercollegiate Tennis Tournament m(NEWITT) at Amherst. After going 2-0 in its dual matches and fairing strongly in its individual tournaments, the team will carry a considerable amount of momentum into the offseason.
"As an entire team, we've made so much improvement throughout the course of the fall season," McCooey said. "The rest of the team played so well at NEWITTs this weekend, and it just showed the entire team that when we work hard, we get the results in the end. I think that really gives everyone the motivation in the offseason to stay in shape and work hard in order to come out in the spring ready to play."
