Virginia Brown found herself in a grueling predicament. After dropping the first two games in her best-of-five match with Trinity's Clare Austin, and knowing that Austin had already beaten her just two weeks ago, Brown knew she had to rewrite history. Eventually, the senior co-captain followed the cues of her teammates and her own instincts to outlast her English opponent in five games.
But that's not even the remarkable thing. What is truly amazing is that Brown's victory was just the icing on the cake, a sweet topping applied to an already astounding weekend during which the Harvard women's squash team captured its 11th national championship at the Howe Cup in New Haven.
"Emotions were running high, and we won with authority," said junior co-captain Margaret Elias. "People played with their hearts and their minds, and it was a great way to end the season."
By the time Brown stepped on the court, five Crimson players had already scored victories to ensure that the Howe Cup would be returning to Cambridge after a three-year hiatus. Only two weeks after losing a 5-4 heartbreaker to arch-rival Trinity, Harvard stepped onto the Yale courts with a mission.
"We knew that we could beat Trinity, and saw this second match with them not so much as revenge but as a time to prove ourselves," Brown said. "When it came down to the final push, we had the guts to pull through."
It was a steady balance of nail-biting victories and thorough obliterations that propelled Harvard to the winner's circle. Early in the final round, No. 3 seed Carlin Wing found herself in a 2-0 hole to Samantha Lewins before finding her stroke and winning the final three games, including the last two by 9-2 margins. Ella Witcher also rebounded from an early deficit to score a four-game win over Mollie Anderson.
While Witcher and Wing had to launch furious comebacks, other Crimson players didn't even give their opponents a chance to make things interesting. No. 2 Margaret Elias dominated All-American Janine
Thompson in three games, and Kristin Wadhwa and Ashley Harmeling also managed decisive victories.
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