PHILADELPHIA, Pa. – The defending Walker Cup Champion and top-seeded Wesleyan women's squash team opened their title defense with a dominant 9-0 win over eight-seed Conn. College on Friday afternoon from the Arlen Specter US Squash Center. The Cardinals (11-5) advance to the semifinal round on Saturday morning where they will face the five-seed Denison at 9 AM.
Wesleyan thoroughly dominated the Camels, winning all nine matches in 3-0 sweeps, while all but one match took less than 20 minutes to finish.
Leandra Sze '26 and Portia Plaim '25 dropped just two points each in their respective matches, with Pliam needed just 11 minutes to get past Angelise Ramirez at #9.
Katherine Risden '28,
Penelope Furnas '27, and
Rachel Matamoros G'25 required just 18 minutes each to win their matches. Risden took down Kairiana Gonzalez 11-1, 11-4, 11-1 at #6 while Furnas defeated Crystal Dixon 11-9, 11-7, 11-4 at #6 and Matamoros was victorious against Miranda Medina 11-2, 11-5, 11-6.
At the top of the lineup,
Mira Bakshi '26 was tested in her match at #1 against Marian Anwar but ultimately it was Bakshi who pulled out the sweep in a 11-6, 11-6, 13-11 win.
Avika Pande '26 pulled out a 11-2, 11-8, 11-4 win at #2 while
Aanya Anand '26 won 11-5, 11-3, 11-7 at #3 and
Jaclyn Dichter '26 finished off the complete sweep with a 11-5, 11-9, 11-4 triumph at #4.
Awaiting the Cardinals in Saturday morning's semifinal match is Denison, whom the Cardinals defeated 8-1 in Middletown in the regular season back on January 19. Wesleyan had seven 3-0 sweeps in that match against the Big Red.
