Shepherd, Charest, Sabatino Lead Terriers Past Princeton, 4-3
February 20, 2005 | Women's Tennis
BOSTON, MA-Juniors Monica Shepherd and Aimee Charest and freshman Gina Sabatino each won singles and doubles matches to lead the Terrier women's tennis team to a 4-3 win over visiting Princeton University on Sunday afternoon, Feb. 20.
It was the fourth straight victory for the Terriers who started their win streak with a 5-2 victory over Rutgers and have followed it up with a 4-3 win over Cornell and a 7-0 shutout of New Hampshire.
"It was a very close match but we were able to pull it out," said Terrier head coach Lesley Sheehan. "Everyone has played great. Monica was involved in two very close matches and she won both of them. She played great as did Aimee and Gina."
The Terriers opened by winning the crucial point in doubles by taking two of the three matches. At number one, Shepherd and Sabatino got by Stephanie Berg and Jessica Siebel, 9-7. Princeton won the number two doubles match when Darcy Robertson and Joanna Roth defeated Laura Ahmes and Cheri Lapane, 8-4.
That left it up to the number three doubles where Charest and Katarina Draganova eliminated Alison Hashmall and Rankin Williams, 8-4.
As was the case in the one-point win over Cornell on Feb. 13, the Terriers used the critical doubles point to good use, as both the Terriers and Tigers won three singles matches. Thus, the doubles point was the deciding factor.
B.U.'s singles wins came at numbers two, three, and four, while Princeton's victories were at numbers one, five, and six.
The clinching point came at number four where Shepherd won a tough three-set match after a tiebreaker. Shepherd lost the first set, 3-6, but came back to win the second set, 6-4. The final set came down to the tiebreaker that Shepherd won, 10-8, to wrap up a 7-6 third set victory and the match for the Terriers.
Earlier, Sabatino defeated Siebel, 6-4, 6-1, at number two singles, while Charest bested Hashmall, 6-4, 6-3, at number three.
The Tigers' singles wins came at number one where Robertson defeated Ahmes, 6-4, 6-3, at number five when Roth squeezed past Draganova, 3-6, 6-4 (10-8) and at number six with Berg defeated Lapane, 6-1, 6-2.
The Terriers will play their seventh straight home match on Wednesday, Feb. 23 when they host West Point at 3:00 p.m.
