After suffering a tough loss to open the season, the Stony Brook women’s tennis team split a pair of matches to earn its first win of the season.
The Seawolves (1-2) traveled up to Connecticut this past weekend and faced the Sacred Heart Pioneers (3-1) on Friday before taking on the Fairfield Stags (0-2) on Saturday. Stony Brook was swept 7-0 by Sacred Heart before bouncing back with a 5-2 victory over Fairfield the next day.
The Seawolves struggled immensely in their doubles matches on Friday, starting with the tandem of Kristi Boro and Elena Lobo-Corral, who were trumped by Katsiaryna Starastsenka and Kim Fenton 6-0. Their next pair — Mia Palladino and Debby Mastrodima — completed their first official tandem match of the spring season, but they fell 6-1 to Vitalina Golod and Flavia Rambaldi.
Cornelia Bruu-Syversen and Dasha Perfiliev built a 4-3 lead against Ciara O’Toole and Aina Garriga, but it went unfinished.
Palladino and Lobo-Corral both finished just short in a pair of tight singles matches. Palladino lost 6-4 in the first set to Starastsenka before dropping the second one 7-6. Their head-to-head matchup ended with Starastsenka winning the tie-break set 7-3. Lobo-Corral and Golod exchanged 6-4 wins against each other, but Golod closed the third set in a long-winded 11-9 triumph.
Boro was the only other Stony Brook player to win a set, as she won the middle set 6-2. However, Rambaldi defeated Boro in the first set 6-1 and 6-2 in the third one to secure the point.
Perfiliev, Bruu-Syversen and Sara Medved all lost their singles matches in just two sets. Garriga finished Perfiliev off with victories of 7-5 and 6-1, while Olivia Kharkover beat Bruu-Syversen 6-3 and 6-4. Medved opened her battle with O’Toole on the wrong side of a 6-1 set before losing the second one 6-2.
After being swept across the board, head coach Thiago Dualiby emphasized the importance of taking charge and playing from ahead.
“We didn’t take the initiative early on,” Dualiby said in a postgame interview with The Statesman. “[We] played a little too reactive in the start of both singles and doubles.”
Saturday was a completely different story for the Seawolves, who won their first five points as a team in the spring season. Bruu-Syversen and Perfiliev started things by teaming up to beat Scarlett Hutchinson and Lucie Tuttle 6-2. After that match finished, a pair of intense doubles matchups took place, but Stony Brook prevailed in both.
Mastrodima and Palladino took on Sarah Liu and Nicolette Loeffler and went into a tiebreaker. Luckily for the Seawolves, Mastrodima and Palladino took the tiebreaker 7-5 to win the match 7-6 and secure the doubles point. Boro and Lobo-Corral stole their match against Lily Malinowski and Francesca Karman by the same score, only they won their tiebreaker 7-2.
Palladino, Lobo-Corral and Medved all conquered their singles matches in similar styles. Palladino matched up one-on-one with Liu and took a 6-1 defeat in the first set before following up with wins of 6-4 and 6-0 to earn the individual victory. Lobo-Corral endured a 6-4 loss in her first set against Katarina Plumtree, but she sprung back in 6-3 and 6-0 fashion. Medved lost her first set 6-2 to Meg Harding before bouncing back with a pair of 6-3 triumphs.
Boro rounded out the singles victories, defeating Loeffler 6-1 and 6-4.
Stony Brook made a bid for a sixth point, as Perfiliev opened her match versus Karman with a 6-3 win. However, Perfiliev lost the following two sets 6-4 and 6-3. Bruu-Syversen failed to find luck against Malinowski, who silenced her with 6-2 and 6-0 set wins.
Following the team’s victory on Saturday, Dualiby was overjoyed.
“I’m really proud of our team today,” Dualiby said. “We showed resilience and resolve, overcoming difficult moments and believing in ourselves throughout. Winning the doubles point today was a result of that.”
The Seawolves will hope to carry their success into next weekend when they return to Connecticut to take on another two teams. Next Friday, they will challenge the University of Connecticut Huskies at 6 p.m. before taking on the Quinnipiac Bobcats at the same time on Saturday night. The Huskies are 4-2 this spring after losing 7-0 to Xavier on Saturday. The Bobcats are 2-3 this spring after beating Stonehill 7-0 on Saturday.
