The Lake Forest College handball teams swept all three national titles by edging out runner-up and host Missouri State University in the men's, women's, and combined team standings at the USHA Collegiate National Championships over the weekend. Forester senior Maria Dugas was the runner-up in both singles and doubles.
Dugas won her first four matches by a combined score of 168-27 before falling in the championship on Sunday. She and junior Amalia DeSardi teamed up to win two of three round robin matches in the women's Open Doubles bracket. It was the second time in Dugas' career that she earned All-America status (top four in singles, top two teams in doubles) and the first such honor for DeSardi.
Junior Isaac Acosta and freshman C.J. Laffey claimed the Foresters only national championship in singles or doubles on the weekend by winning all three of their Open Doubles matches. They lost their first game 21-11 in the quarterfinals before taking the second 21-8 and the tiebreaker 11-0. Their semifinal match was even closer as the they split 21-20 decisions in the first two games before prevailing 11-7 in the tiebreaker. Their 21-19, 21-9 victory in the final was, by comparison, a lopsided score.
Acosta also earned All-America status in singles, where he advanced to the semifinals before falling to the eventual champion for the second year in a row. He advanced to the final four after posting an 11-21, 21-11, 11-0 triumph in the quarterfinals.
Three Foresters were stopped in the Open Singles quarterfinals. DeSardi and sophomore Samantha Zender each won her first two matches before falling in the round of eight. Zender was edged out 11-10 in the tiebreaker and DeSardi was knocked off by the eventual champion. On the men's side senior Riley Kloss also won back-to-back contests before being eliminated by the eventual runner-up.
Once slotted in the A Singles bracket, senior Ann Szutenbach rattled off three straight victories before falling in the final. Laffey and fellow freshman Eric Matiasek reached the round of 16 in the Men's A Singles tourney.
Three of the four semifinalists in the Men's B Singles bracket were Foresters. Senior Dan Sterrett was the runner-up after winning outlasting his opponent 21-16, 14-21, 11-4 in the quarterfinals and edging out junior Justin Novak 10-21, 21-14, 11-7 in the semifinals. Junior Derrick Contreras also reached the semifinals before falling to the eventual champion, who had also knocked off Lake Forest junior Geoff Douglas in the quarterfinals. On the women's side sophomore Aimee Fadden and freshman Brooke Perkins combined to win five of eight matches and both players advanced to the B Singles round of 16.
Junior Clark Creasey reached the C Singles semifinals and classmate Peter Jansen won six matches in a row to claim the Intermediate Singles crown.
In Division 2 singles action junior Camila Quinteros advanced to the quarterfinals in the A Division, freshman Gracie Mullins was a finalist in the B bracket, and sophomores Colleen Hosman and Aleks Petrovic reached the B Division's quarterfinals and preliminary round, respectively. Freshman Caitlin Shetterley made it to the quarterfinal round and classmate Josh Poncedeleon the round of 16 in the C Division.
Jake Julius, another freshman, won five times on the weekend to claim the Division 3 A bracket title.
Zender and Szutenbach placed third in the Women's Open Doubles competition while Kloss and Matiasek joined Contreras and Sterrett as Men's Open Doubles quarterfinalists.
Douglas and Jansen needed a tiebreaker to escape the quarterfinal round but eventually captured the B Doubles title. Fadden and Quinteros teamed up to reach the B Doubles quarterfinals on the women's side.
Lake Forest players combined for a 79-57 record during the five-day event.
The sweep of the three team championships is the fourth in a row and sixth overall for the Foresters. Head Coach Mike Dau '58 has led the team to a total of 42 titles since starting the program in 1968.
Looking ahead, the women's team will lose Dugas and Szutenbach and the men will go on without Kloss and Sterrett after the four seniors graduate in May.
