It’s been three years since the women’s tennis team last made it to the GNAC semifinals. This year the team has worked really hard and all that hard work paid off. The Lady Rams posted their best result since the 2009-2010 season. Last Saturday, the team faced Johnson & Wales in a nerve-wracking match which the Lady Rams lost 6-3. This is the closest the team has been to reaching the GNAC final since they were last in the finals in 2007 when they captured the title.
Freshman and first single for Suffolk, Aidiana Sagyndykova was the only Lady Ram to win both of her matches on that night. In singles she posted an outstanding 7-5, 6-1 victory over the experienced Junior Samantha Jo Borr. Sagyndykova earned a first- team All-Conference selection in the GNAC. With the talented player on the team, the Lady Rams future is looking bright.
The season might have started out with difficulties, but in the end the team made it further in the GNAC tournament than previous years. The Suffolk University women’s tennis team is in fact the first Suffolk team to reach the GNAC semifinals so far this year. The Lady Rams posted a 5-9 record this season, having won five out of their last eight contests of the season. Head coach Steve Counihan was excited heading in to the playoffs and talked about the team:
“We are very excited to be in the playoffs. We are playing really well right now for a couple of reasons. One of the reasons is because we got a new player about a month after the season started. She is very talented. She is a freshman from Kazachstan and she sort of united the rest of the team to play a lot better, give a lot more and play a lot quicker.”
All in all, women’s tennis had a great season and lost to a worthy opponent in Johnson & Wales. Next season, four great players will be greatly missed as they all graduate this summer. The four seniors who all represented the women’s tennis team for four years are: Melissa Chermely, Elizabeth Arkins, Stacey Politis and Allison Weisenbach. There is no doubt that next season is going to be a lot different next year without the four seniors and the team will go through a huge transition to a new team.
