Results
WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — Four-time defending NCAA Division III National Champion, and top-ranked, Williams College ended the Elizabethtown College women's tennis team's most successful season in school history Saturday afternoon in the second round of the 2012 NCAA Tournament. The Blue Jays made the Ephs work hard to advance, but Williams wore down E-town to take the match, 6-0, and advance to the Sweet 16.
Carrying an NCAA DIII record six national titles around —all coming since 2001— Williams were the heavy favorites on their home courts. But the 18-win Blue Jays, ranked 12th in the ITA Atlantic South Region, did not go to Massachusetts for a vacation. The squad won its first ever NCAA match in program history Friday and were determined to stand in and give the Ephs (20-2) their best shot.
Madison Pipkin and Allison Burkhardt gave Williams' No. 1 doubles pair of Taylor French and Kara Shoemaker a hard time before falling 8-4. French and Shoemaker entered the match ranked sixth in the ITA Northeast Region. The Ephs lineup was full of regionally-ranked players, including two of their doubles teams and four singles players.
E-town's second doubles team of Alena Marani and Kristi Noecker clawed out two games of their set against Kristin Alotta and Kathleen Elkins, the Northeast Region's ninth ranked tandem. The stubborn Jays (18-3) just couldn't get over the hump to steal a point, and the Ephs swept doubles play with an 8-0 win at No. 3 by Rebecca Curran and Caroline Capute.
The immense skill this year's Elizabethtown team possesses showed through in singles play. Even though Williams was able to win the necessary matches to move on, not one player from the No. 1 team in the country swept a Blue Jay. Pipkin quite possibly may have played one of, if not, the best set of her season in the opener against Alotta, the region's second ranked singles player. The junior from Landisville led the set 4-3, before ultimately falling 6-4. Pipkin's match went unfinished.
Shoemaker, No. 6 in the region, upped the WC lead to 3-0 with a 6-0, 6-1 win against Marani at flight two singles. Shortly thereafter the No. 5 and No. 6 singles matches finished up at nearly the exact same time, allowing for the 6-0 final. Capute got by Christine Evangelista 6-2, 6-1 at No. 5 and Curran bested E-town senior Sarah Poulle, 6-0, 6-2.
Third singles player, Burkhardt, and fourth singles entry, Noecker, each took a game for the Blue Jays in their second sets before both matches were stopped.
Elizabethtown wraps up its historic season with a school-record 18 wins, supplanting the 2006-07 team which finished 17-3. Poulle, the team's only senior, completed her final year in a Blue Jay uniform with a 17-5 singles record and leaves the program with a 42-18 mark to her credit. Her 42 singles victories are tied for eighth most in school history.
Williams continues on to the Sweet 16, where it will face either Salem State or Tufts tomorrow afternoon at 3:30 p.m.