In their last warm-up before playing in the USTA National Tennis Center Invitational, members of Binghamton University women’s tennis team competed in the three-day Cissie Leary Invitational this weekend, hosted by the University of Pennsylvania.
The team’s best performance at the tournament came from doubles pair junior Jillian Santos and senior Yulia Smirnova. The duo cruised through the first two days, beating teams from Temple University and Penn in the first two rounds, 8-2 and 8-6, respectively. In the third round Santos and Smirnova faced off against fellow Bearcats Lauren Bates and Marina Bykovskaya, who had defeated pairs from Ivy League schools Columbia University and Princeton University. Santos and Smirnova defeated their teammates 8-1 to move on to the doubles semifinal round.
In the semifinals, Santos and Smirnova continued their hot play, defeating Daniela DePaoli and Stephanie Do of host Penn by a score of 8-2 to advance to the final round. The streak of wins came to an end in the finals, though, where they went on to lose to senior Alexa Ely and freshman Connie Hsu, also of Penn, 8-6. Hsu has been ranked No. 4 of incoming freshmen in the country.
Doubles pair Emma Leibowicz, a junior, and sophomore Jessie Rubin also participated in the tournament. They had a first-round bye, but lost in the second round to DePaoli and Do, 8-6. The other doubles pair was made up of senior Anna Edelman and freshman Jennifer Fridman, who lost in the first round.
The Bearcats had far more success in the singles bracket, with four players advancing to the quarterfinal round. The success of Smirnova and Santos in doubles play translated to singles play, as both players won their quarterfinal matches. Smirnova beat teammate Edelman 6-2, 7-5 to advance, while Santos won by default. Bates also advanced to the quarters, but lost to Penn’s Hsu.
Unfortunately for BU, both Smirnova and Santos lost in the semifinals in straight sets. Smirnova fell 6-1, 6-3 to Ana Belzunce of the University of Maryland, while Santos dropped her match 6-3, 6-2 to Hsu. Hsu would go on to take the singles title, giving her first-place finishes in both the singles and doubles brackets.
Binghamton is coming off a good showing in the Cornell Fall Women’s Tennis Invitational. In that tournament, Santos captured the flight A singles title, the doubles pair of Bates and Leibowicz lost in the flight A doubles final and Bykovskaya and Santos lost in the flight B doubles final.
Women’s tennis is next scheduled to be in action from Oct. 9-11 at the USTA Invitational. It is a national tournament held at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Flushing, N.Y. Last year in the same tournament, against top competition, Smirnova, Bykovskaya and Leibowicz each won a singles match. On the doubles side, Bates and Santos won one match.
-Ryan Cody contributed to this report.