The College of Staten Island women’s tennis team saw their four-match win streak halted tonight, falling to Yeshiva University in a match that could ultimately be protested by a 5-4 count.  CSI fell to 7-3 with the loss, while the Maccabees improved to 8-1.

The clincher in the match came on a win by Rachel Slater in No. 3 Singles over Katherine Villarroel as a result of a super tie-breaker that CSI was not in favor of playing over a complete third set, but did so due to lighting issues at the National Tennis Center in Flushing.  

The Dolphins took a 2-1 lead after Doubles play, winning at both the first and third flights.  Smanatha Maizer and Villarroel did the honors in the first spot by an 8-2 count, but Yeshiva got even thanks to an 8-5 winner in the second flight by the team of Andrea Weiss and Slater over CSI’s Tristiana Adragna and Mariah DeGuia.  Attention then turned to the No. 3 position, where Hannah Bruschi and Guetanie Romain were locked in an even battle with YU’s Railey Frohlich and Rikki Weingarten.  After an 8-8 stalemate, CSI was able to pull out a thrilling, 10-8, win in the tiebreak to prevail.

Play then turned to Singles and that’s where YU came on strong, winning every flight from No. 3-down.  Frohlich was able to defeat Bruschi at No. 4, 6-2, 6-1, and one step lower, Weiss, got through DeGuia, 6-2, 6-2.  CSI roared back with a 6-2, 6-2, win from Maizer at the top spot over Adele Lerner, to knot the score at 3-3, but YU took the 4-3 lead when Shana Adler scored a 6-0, 6-2, win over Romain at No. 6.

Nos. 2-3 Singles, however, were extremely competitive.  In the No. 3 spot, Slater started exceptionally strong, and won a 6-2 game over Villarroel.  But Villarroel turned things around in the second set, and looked terrific in a 6-1 win.  With the match now three hours long, CSI opted to play a third set to determine the winner in the third flight, as per ITA protocol, but a lighting issue that threatened to suspend play forced a super tie-break, and under protest, Villarroel fell to Slater, 10-7.  That was the clincher for YU, so upon winning, Rebecca Packer retired in her match with Adragna.  Packer had won the first set 7-6 (7-1), but Adragna stormed back to win the second set, 6-2, before the resignation.

CSI will now wrap up the regular season officially on Wednesday, travelling to Kean University for a 6:30pm contest in Union, NJ.