In a hotly contested match, the BU women’s tennis team lost its first dual meet of the season to UMass last Friday night in Ithaca. The loss dropped Binghamton to 6-1 on the year.
The teams split the singles matches, but the Minutemen (7-3) picked up the doubles point to earn a 4-3 victory for the third straight season.
‘To compete 4-3 with them is very encouraging,’ said head coach Mike Stevens. ‘We learned from the loss, [but] have you ever talked to a coach after a match that wasn’t disappointed?’
He said that even at 6-0, with some difficult out-of-conference wins over Seton Hall, Army and Colgate under his belt, he never thought about the notion of going undefeated.
‘I don’t think about that at all, it’s not something to think or worry about,’ he said. ‘If those things happen, that’s great. If they don’t, that’s fine, too.’
Senior Zeynep Altinay, the program’s all-time leader in wins with 79, came up short in her first attempt at 80 with a 6-0, 7-6 (7-3) first-singles loss to Michele Spiess, an opponent she defeated in 2005 but lost to in both the spring and fall of 2006.
‘Zeynep doesn’t need to change her game for anyone she plays,’ Stevens said. ‘She’s a great player.’
The fourth-year head coach added that he’s enjoying the first season that the roster has had seniors ‘ Altinay and classmates Lya Kushnirovich and J.J. Koprivica ‘ since his hire in 2003.
‘Certainly this is the strongest team we’ve had since I’ve been here,’ he said. ‘This is the first year we’ve had seniors, so that’s a good thing for us.’
Binghamton opens the in-conference portion of its schedule with a March 24 match at Hartford, a team the Bearcats have defeated 7-0 every year since 2002, including a sweep last year in which Binghamton only lost five total games as a team.