Men's and women's squash both drop home openers

It had to happen eventually. After both squash teams strung together win after win in their inaugural seasons, they had to hit a roadblock at some point.

The women, coming off a seven-match win streak which included a win over the then No. 13 Mount Holyoke, looked primed to continue their dominant run. But in its home opener this weekend, the No. 14 ranked Columbia women’s squash team suffered its first loss since November, falling to current No. 13 Bates, 7-2. Before the defeat, the only other team to which the women had lost was No. 4 Princeton.

In the contest, freshmen Katie Quan (No. 4) and Skylar Dickey (No. 5) secured the lone points for Columbia (7-2), winning their individual matches 3-1.

The men’s squash team, ranked No. 27, dropped a tough 8-1 loss to No. 15 Navy. The top matches for Columbia (5-2) were all closely contested, though. Sophomore Graham Miao (No. 1) narrowly fell to Navy’s Allan Lutz, losing his match in five games. Senior Clayton Dahlman (No. 2) won a thrilling 3-2 contest, slamming home Columbia’s lone individual match with an 11-2 fifth-set victory. Sophomore standout Tony Zou dropped the No. 3 spot, losing a close four-set match

Both squash teams will look to rebound on January 29th in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., and get a new run started when they take on Vassar, Northeastern, and Bard (men only).