Coming up just one match short to a team it was to weak to even play last year, the No. 39 Harvard women’s tennis team narrowly lost a tough 4-3 battle Saturday to No. 2 Duke.

The Crimson team almost pulled an upset at home with over a hundred supporters in attendence, strong doubles play and an injured second singles player on the Duke team.

The doubles point hung in the balance with Duke dominating in the No. 3 doubles spot and the Crimson narrowly escaping a come-from-behind charge at No. 2 doubles.

At the top doubles spot, junior Sanja Bajin and freshman Alexis Martire were down a game in every change over until 5-6. The two rallied from behind and won three straight games in a row, completing the doubles victory for the Crimson.

“Sonja has a lot of net skills and I have the baseline so it works out,” Martire said of the duo’s success.

Controversy delayed the start of the singles portion of the match. Duke’s No. 2 singles player Amanda Johnson—ranked 26th in the nation—injured herself during doubles play and the Blue Devils needed a replacement. Duke almost got away with placing in the No. 6 singles spot a player ranked higher than their No. 3 and No. 4 players, an illegal move.

Despite the injury at the No. 2 spot, Crimson racquetwomen couldn’t withstand the Duke assault, although Martire and co-captain Fleur Broughton both emerged victorious in singles.

Martire lost the first set of her match 6-2, but managed to refocus and win the next two sets 7-5, 6-0.

“I played one of the best matches I’ve ever played,” Martire said.

The Crimson team considers it a measure of its strength to even have Duke as an opponent. Nonconference tennis matches are arranged by coaches looking to give their teams a competitve match and improve their national standing.

“In the past, we wouldn’t be strong enough to play Duke, but the freshmen are really good and brought up our ranking,” Bajin said.

The team, ranked second in the Ivy League to No. 31 Penn, is poised to play tennis powerhouses No. 1 Stanford and No. 27 Pepperdine over spring break—a testament to the Crimson’s new depth.

“There is really good diversity on the team and the freshmen added to an already pretty strong team,” Martire said.