Box Score WHITTIER, Calif. (Feb. 17. 2024) – Exceptional doubles play across the board propelled the Whittier College women's tennis team to a huge victory over Lewis & Clark College in Saturday's non-conference match. The win is the Poets' first in almost year, as their last victory came against Wheaton College last March.
Whittier's greatest adversity in the opening set of matches came at first doubles, where senior
Keely Arendt (Canyon Lake, Calif. / Riverside City College) and sophomore
Malvika Suryavanshi (Bangalore, India / Sophia) dug deep to earn an 8-7 win over the Pioneers' top doubles team. While the match ultimately came down to a tiebreaker, Arendt and Suryavanshi prevailed 7-2 to give the Purple & Gold a massive 3-0 advantage heading into singles play. They were far from the only pair of Poets, however, to impress in doubles play. Senior
Maci Davis (Atlanta, Ga. / Brookwood) teamed with freshman singles star
Chanel Zeraatkar at second doubles, and defeated their opponents, 8-2, in stellar fashion. Meanwhile, senior
Manasvi Vardham (Bengaluru, Karnataka, India / Delhi Public School, Whitefield) combined with sophomore
Monze Meraz-Lerma (Hacienda Heights, Calif. / Glen A. Wilson) at third doubles, and scored a well-earned 8-3 victory.
With Whittier needing just two singles triumphs to clinch a team victory for the day, the Poets did one better by splitting singles play with the Pioneers to complete a 6-3 win. Zeraatkar showcased her resilience at first singles, overcoming a 1-6 first set to rally 6-4 in the second before pulling out a competitive super tiebreaker, 10-7. However, Whittier managed to earn more emphatic victories at third and fifth singles. Arendt, Whittier's third singles player, won her match, 7-5, 6-2, while Vardham won with relative ease, earning a 6-3, 6-1 win to complete a two-win day.
Head Coach Aron Hayes and the Poets will look to build on their early-season momentum when they host Brandeis University, the 26th-ranked team in Division III, on Monday, Feb. 19.
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