This post was written by Hatchet reporter Kimberly Shi.
After experiencing upsets over the last three matches, including a loss on Saturday, GW had a strong finish to the weekend’s play with a 5-2 victory against Morgan State Sunday. Due to impending inclement weather, the match was moved to the indoor Montclair County Club in Virginia.
The Colonials swept doubles play and ended Morgan State’s four-match winning streak in singles play.
“We need to continue on improving and sustaining a level of urgency if we want to accomplish our goals this season,” head coach Dawn Buth said, “We had a strong start this season jumping off to a 7-2 record and our players met as a team last week to identify key areas that needed adjustments
With a triumph in every doubles match, No. 1 tandem of senior Mimi Hamling and junior Leah Pascarella started the trend by coming out on top with an 8-5 win against Mi’Kola Cooper and Chelsi Russell. Following this was the No. 2 and 3 doubles match, where senior Dorota Lysienia and freshman Lana Robins defeated Jasmine Edwards and Ekaterina Lakovleva 8-2 and Christina Carpenter and Stephanie Wei, a rookie duo, overpowered Arina Alilueva and Margarita Belyakova 8-5.
During the singles play, Robins blanked Mi’Kola Cooper, 6-0, in the first set before Cooper retired. Afterwards, Wei won a three-set victory against Russell with scores of 4-6, 6-1, 6-2, and this was followed by the No. 4 match, where Carpenter blanked Edwards, No. 6, in the first set followed by a 2-0 advantage before Edwards retired.
“We’ve put together a plan to move forward, but in order to meet our short term goals we’ll need absolute commitment from each of our eight team members,” Buth said. “In addition, our upperclassmen will need to understand and prioritize their leadership role as a critical piece of our success.”
It’s going to be a challenging match next week as the Colonials face off against Temple, their Atlantic 10 foe, Saturday.
“Temple is ranked 4 in the pre-season A-10 polls,” Buth said. “We have a great opportunity this Saturday to gain footing in the top of the conference. We’ll be focusing on movement, defensive conversions and creating competitive and high urgency practice environments. “
