The Brown squash teams' mental strength and perseverance paid off Wednesday night as they beat Tufts at the Belmont Hill School in Massachusetts.
After several hours of play, the men won their last two matches to beatthe Jumbos, 5-4, bringing their record to 3-8 for the season. After three tense matches last week, the women's squad finally got a break, dominating the Jumbos in a 9-0 victory, earning its eighth win in 14 matches this season.
Having played well in their last few matches, the men went into their encounter confident they could win. But a motivated and determined Tufts squad seemed eager for an upset, winning three of the first four matches. But the Bears' remained unrattled.
No. 5 Evan Besser '11 and No. 2 Adam Greenberg '10 pulled out two spectacular five-game victories to keep their team in contention.
Greenberg managed to keep his cool despite losing the fourth game after holding match ball at 8-6. He performed brilliantly in the fifth game, winning the match with a final score of 10-9, 2-9, 9-6, 6-9. 9-4.
"I knew I was going to have to win my match for us to beat Tufts overall," Greenberg said. "If I lost we would have been placed into a lower draw at Nationals."
After his win, there were two must-win matches left. No. 7 Patrick Davis '10 and No. 4 Adrian Leanza '11 then performed brilliantly, both winning the needed matches in three games.
The women all played fantastic matches. Co-captain Megan Cerullo '08 led by example, beating her opponent in three games(9-6, 9-3, 9-0). In the other matches, only two went beyond the minimum three games, giving the Bears an easy win before this weekend's match against Yale. Yale will be the women's final opponent before the Howe Cup at Princeton on Feb. 21.
"We all played really well," Cerullo said. "It's always a confidence booster to win 9-0, especially after all of the close matches we've had in the last week."
Of the upcoming match against Yale, Cerullo added, " I'm looking forward to it. They're a really good team so it should be a tough competition. I always prefer to play up and we'll be prepared for a really tough match."
The men are looking forward to a close match as well.
"As a team, we have to have everyone firing on all cylinders for Yale so that that will carry through for (the) MIT/Northeastern (matches) and the Nationals at Harvard in mid-February," Head Coach Stuart LeGassick said.
The Bears will meet Yale tomorrow at the Pizzitola Center with the men playing at 12 p.m. and women at 2 p.m.
