Yale Athletics

On Friday, the No. 8 Yale women’s squash team (5–8, 2–4 Ivy) traveled to the Penn Squash Center to kick off play in the 2023 College Squash Association Team National Championships. 

After a weekend of competition, the women fell to Trinity College (18–1, 0–0 NESCAC) and Drexel University (13–4, 0–0 MASC) and rallied to beat Cornell University (9–8, 5–2 Ivy) in the Howe Cup.  

On Friday, the women began CSA Championship play against No. 1 Trinity, falling 0–9 to the Bantams. 

“I think this weekend of competition taught our team to really believe in the process,” Meghna Sreedhar ’25 wrote to the News. “We had some tough competition but were able to find successful moments in all of our matches by sticking to the game plan and working for every point. My personal highlight of the weekend was watching my teammates put in their best efforts for our final matches of the season.”

On Saturday, the women continued into the consolation set of matches. The Bulldogs fell to the No. 4 Dragons 2–7. The Blue and White fought hard, with Whitney Taylor ’26 and Joy Qu ’26 both losing their matches with close scorelines of 2–3. 

On Sunday, the Bulldogs rallied after a long weekend to compete in their final match of the Howe Cup against No. 6 Cornell. The Bulldogs were victorious over the Big Red 5–4. Sreedhar, Mika Bardin ’26, Lindsay Westerfield ’25, Qu and captain Brianna Jefferson ’23 won their matches for the Bulldogs. 

“The team faced tough opponents this past weekend, but showed grit to flip the Cornell result from earlier in the season, demonstrating that the more determined team will come out victorious,” assistant coach Tate Miller wrote to the News. “I will always remember watching Joy Qu come back from 10–7 down in the fifth game against Cornell and clinching the match for the Bulldogs.”

Yale women’s squash entered the 2022–2023 Howe Cup as the eighth seed and finished seventh in this year’s National Collegiate Women’s Varsity Team Championship. The top five finishers in this year’s CSA championships were Harvard (14–1, 6–0 Ivy), Trinity, University of Virginia (13–7, 0–0 MASC), Drexel and Columbia (5–8, 3–3 Ivy).  

Last year, the Bulldogs entered the tournament as the fifth seed and finished fourth. 

“I am really proud of the team for their tenacity this season,” Jefferson wrote to the News. “We had a lot of setbacks with injuries and such, but I am so glad that we were able to finish strong through nationals.”

Harvard women’s squash won this year’s Howe Cup. The Crimson has won the CSA Team National Championships every year since 2015, except 2021 when there was no tournament play due to COVID-19. 

Looking ahead, the Bulldogs will compete in the College Squash Association Individual and Doubles Championships at the Arlen Specter US Squash Center in Philadelphia, PA during the weekend of March 1.