Sept. 27, 2009

West Point, N.Y. - Stony Brook's women's tennis team spent their second weekend of Fall competition at the Eastern Championships hosted by the United States Military Academy. After three days of competition the top result for the Seawolves was in doubles where the team of junior Fanny Charliquart (Gueugnon, France) and freshman Aylin Mehter (Massapequa, N.Y.) reached the finals of the main draw in the 2nd doubles bracket.

Seeded No. 1 in the bracket, Charliquart and Mehter received a bye in the first round before scoring an 8-4 win over Loewenstein/Warshavsky from Quinnipiac. The duo then triumphed over a team from Bowdoin College, 8-2, to reach the semifinals. There the pairing squared off against the team of Ford/Tang from Syracuse, coming out on top in a close 8-6 win to reach the finals. Taking on the second seeded team of Leong/Lim from Cornell, the Seawolves duo came up just short of taking home the title, falling by an 8-3 score.

In other doubles play the Stony Brook team of freshman Nini Lagvilava (Tiblisi, Georgia) and sophomore Anna Pieschl (Gothenburg, Sweden) won its first match in the 1st doubles draw over a team from Seton Hall, 8-2, before being ousted in a close 8-6 match by a team from Bowdoin.

Singles play did not go the Seawolves way over the weekend, as just sophomore Prerana Appineni (Hyderabad, India) was able to win more than one match. The third seed in the 4th singles bracket, she started play with a 6-3, 6-0 win over Courtney Kilarsky from Seton Hall. She then took a 6-1, 6-2 decision over Alyssa Ruiz of Fairfield before advancing to the semifinals with a 7-5, 6-1 victory over Connecticut's Alexa Gregory. Facing the No. 1 seed, Simone Kalhorn from Syracuse, she come out on the short end of a 6-1, 6-1 decision.

Senior Paola Rodolfe (Asuncion, Paraguay), junior Gayatri Krishnan (Chennai, India) and sophomores Katherine Hanson (Smithtown, N.Y.) and Salome Mkervalidze (Brewster, N.Y.) all split a pair of matches for the Seawolves.

Stony Brook will play again when it hosts St. Peter's and Sacred Heart on Saturday, October 3 at University Courts on the Stony Brook University campus.