The Lake Forest College women's tennis team clinched the program's first Midwest Conference championship since 2003 on Sunday. The Foresters defeated visiting Cornell College 7-2 and had a slight tiebreaker edge over St. Norbert College and Grinnell College in tiebreaker, who also finished the league's regular season with a 9-1 conference record.
The Foresters began the day by sweeping the three doubles matches. Seniors Christi Valicenti and Grace Dowling prevailed 8-2 at the top spot in the lineup, freshmen Billie Rodman and Allison Watts won 8-0 at #2, and junior Zoe Maurer teamed up with freshman Tricia Paterakos on an 8-6 triumph at #3.
After Cornell earned a point at #4 singles, Valicenti finished off a 6-4, 6-2 victory at #2 and Rodman clinched the team win by prevailing 6-3, 4-6, 6-2 at #1. Dowling added a 6-3, 6-4 win at #3 and Paterakos posted a 6-4, 5-7, (10-2) victory at #6.
Lake Forest is now 11-1 overall this season. The Rams fell to 7-7 overall and 6-4 in the conference.
Since Lake Forest, St. Norbert, and Grinnell went 1-1 against each other and each of the three matches were 5-4 decisions, the tiebreaking process moved on to head-to-head set won and the Foresters' 17 were one more than Grinnell and St. Norbert had. The year's team joins the 1999 and 2003 Foresters as the only MWC champions in program history.
Both teams will compete in the MWC Individual Tournaments next weekend in Madison, Wisconsin.
