In the opening match of the season, the Brandeis women’s tennis team failed to build on their 15-5 record from the previous season, even though the team maintained the majority of their roster. The Judges were ranked 22nd in the final Intercollegiate Tennis Association poll from 2011 while the Tufts Jumbos were ranked 14th.

The Judges failed to close out many of their opponents as they lost three singles matches in tiebreakers. In the No. 1 singles match, All-American Carley Cooke ’15 dropped her first match of the season to Lindsey Katz, despite winning the first set, 4-6, 6-3 and 10-4. Faith Broderick ’13 lost to Samantha Gann in No. 2 singles 6-4, 2-6 and 10-4 even though she appeared to have momentum on her side after winning the second set. In No. 6 singles, Maya Vasser ’16 lost to Catherin Wooley, 3-6, 7-5 and 10-3, in a tiebreaker after the two split the first two sets.

Cooke and Broderick also suffered an upset in No. 1 doubles, losing to the Tufts tandem of Lindsey Katz and Shelci Bowman 8-5.

In No. 3 singles, Allyson Bernstein ’14 fell to Bowman in straight sets 6-0, 6-2 while Simone Vandroff ’15 was dispatched by Sophie Schonfeld in straight sets 7-5, 6-1 at No. 4 singles. Finally, Lauren Hollender also defeated Roberta Bergstein ’14 in straight sets 6-2, 6-1 at No. 5 singles.

At No.2 and No. 3 doubles, the Tufts pairs of Gann and Schonfeld and Janice Lam and Hollender defeated the Brandeis duos of Alexa Katz ’14 and Dylan Schlesinger ’15 and Vandroff and Vasser 8-1 and 8-3 respectively.

The Judges were competitive in many of their matches against Tufts but were unable to finish off any of the matches to register a point.

Brandeis will try to rebound from the tough loss and clean up their mistakes this weekend at the ITA New England Regional at MIT.