Girls' Squash Pushes Through Difficult Season

Record: 3-12 The winter season for girls’ varsity squash was oneplagued by injuries and heavy losses. Their season recordof 3-12 consisted of a few wins but also several 0-7 defeats.Nevertheless, their season record does not re ect their performancethroughout the year. In order to make up for the loss offour members of their varsity team, co-captains senior MarisaBhargava and upper Madeleine Tan pushed the team to practicehard during the fall and then to push past defeat during theseason. The girls regrouped at the end to give a strong showingat the Interscholastic Tournament in the B Division, placingjust shy of the top three by a single point. The performanceput them in 20th place overall in New England.While the 2013-2013 season may have been rough, thegirls have a bright future. Lower Elizabeth Wei made her wayto the quarter nals at spot number one at Interschols whileTan placed second at spot two and prep Taylor Jean-Jacquesentered the season as a surprise Varsity player and ended winningher division.Assistant coach Bruce Shang stated that they will haveto go back to the basics during the next season. “Next year,we have to train our foundation skills more than anything,”Shang said. “Our strokes and our strategy are going to be thefactors that win us the games.”“Another one of the teams’ areas of weakness, is the lackof experience of match play. As the team members play morematches, the weakness will become our strength,” head coachFreddy Brussel added.Tan has high hopes for next year as well. “We lost a lot oftalented seniors from last year, but many of the younger playersfrom this year made up for our losses,” Tan said. UpperGrace Song, who played a number of matches for varsity thisyear, as well as upper Avian Song will return as strong seniors.Upper Elle MacAlpine, who will captain the team nextyear alongside Tan, agreed. “We de nitely got a lot of goodsurprises this year. Two of the preps, Taylor Jean-Jacques andAudrey DeGuerrera, played incredibly well and placed highon the ladder. Taylor played on the varsity team while Audreyplayed high on the junior varsity.”Jean-Jacques, who had not played squash before comingto Exeter, was quick to pick up on the game’s strokes andshot selection. Jean-Jacques credited two main factors forher quick improvement. “Tennis de nitely helped becauseracquet sports are similar. For example, eye coordinationfrom tennis transfers over to squash,” Jean-Jacques said. “Ialso found myself improving because of the willingness ofmy experienced coaches and teammates to help me in everyway they could.”The type of nurturing attitude of the squash team thathelped foster young players like Jean-Jacques will be a keyfactor next season as well. “When the team gets together andjust really gets along well and works together really well, that’swhen people start learning,” Shang said. “This is de nitelysomething that needs to happen in order for next season to bemore successful than the last. Since squash is such an individualsport, it is sometimes hard for the girls to realize thatwhen they’re on the court, they are most de nitely not playingfor themselves. Each girl is playing for the team.”MacAlpine hopes to bring the same spirit of togethernessduring next year’s practices. “Even though people playeach other on the ladder, each girl needs to realize that laddermatches that decided spots aren’t supposed to be cutthroat andindividual-based,” MacAlpine said. “They’re really basedon the concept of making the team as strong as possible inevery spot.”Tan looks forward to this kind of team spirit in the nextseason. “Elle and I want to lead players to see their role on theteam in this way,” Tan said. “We really look to prove ourselvestogether as a team, rather than individually.”Perhaps one more chance to prove themselves maypresent itself in the 2013-2014 season. This year, inclementweather kept both the boys’ and girls’ squash teams withinExeter when the National High School Squash Championshipswere scheduled to take place. Next year, Nationals willbe moved outside the regular season, preventing either teamfrom going.However, if the season records of both teams are strongenough, the captains for next year hope to make a case to theadministration for a school-supported trip. “We know that ifwe want to accomplish this, we’ll have to work hard to keepour tness up both during the season and outside of it,” MacAlpinesaid. “I’m de nitely hoping to see the girls playingwhenever they can during the fall term. The time and effortthat we put in will produce results for us.”Next season, the girls hope to make a big impact in theA division of the tournament. The strength and talent of theyounger players on the team will make them a much strongerforce than in previous years. While their season record of threewins and 12 losses fell short of their goals during this year, thegirls hope to nd success where they failed this time around. “Itis up to us what happens in this next season, whether good orbad,” Shang said. “Our performance will be what we make it.”