Both the Notre Dame men’s and women’s tennis teams entered Easter break on a high note. The men’s team had snapped a five-game losing streak with consecutive victories over Boston College and Butler. And the No. 23 women’s team had won three of its last four, also coming into the break with two straight wins, soundly defeating No. 25 Wake Forest and Louisville by a combined margin of 12-2.
However, things took a downward turn for both squads over the last week. Each team played twice over the weekend and though men’s tennis started its slate with a victory, the teams lost each of the other three matches.
Men’s tennis defeated Clemson 4-3 on Friday before falling 4-0 on Easter Sunday to Georgia Tech. The Irish doubles teams set the tone, as Notre Dame took the first two matches to finish. Senior Connor Fu and junior Jean-Marc Malkowski dominated, winning 6-1. Freshman Evan Lee and sophomore Yu Zhang also brought home a 6-4 win. Singles came down to the wire, with the victor still in the balance until the final match concluded. Marc-Malkowski came through in the clutch, beating Matt Pitts despite losing the first set. Fu and sophomore Jameson Corsillo also notched singles wins. However, the Irish were thoroughly defeated by Georgia Tech, dropping all of their matches.
Meanwhile, the women’s team lost consecutive matches for the first time in almost a month. The state of Florida did not treat the Irish kindly, as they lost 4-1 to Florida State on Thursday and 5-2 to No. 14 Miami on Saturday. The Irish were fantastic in doubles in both matches, however. Senior Page Freeman and sophomore Maria Olivia Castedo notched a 6-3 win to seal the doubles victory against the Seminoles after sophomore Carrie Beckman and junior Julia Andreach secured their match. Beckman and freshman Bojana Pozder started the Irish out strong in doubles against Miami. And a 7-5 win by freshman Rylie Hanford and junior Yashna Yellayi secured another doubles decision. However, Pozder’s singles victory against Miami was Notre Dame’s lone individual win of the two matches.
The men’s team returns to action on Thursday night for its regular season finale against Louisville. The game is on the road at 3 p.m. and will be available on the ACC Network. Women’s tennis has two more matches before its regular season schedule concludes. The team is home against Syracuse on Friday and Boston College on Sunday. The Syracuse match begins at 3:30 p.m. and the Boston College match starts at 11 a.m. Both matches will be streamed on the Notre Dame athletics website.
