Girls’ Squash Falls 6-1 to Andover

ANDOVER, MA – This Wednesday, girls’ squash played their second—and final—match against Andover. With the excitement of the Exeter/Andover match, their spirits were high. Even though they had lost to Andover the first time they played against each other, they played their hardest. Unfortunately, Big Red’s varsity squad lost, after a series of tough, close matches.“We weren’t all surprised by the results because the same sort of thing happened last time,” lower Audrey Deguerrera said. “JV won the last time, but varsity lost. Still, everyone played with a lot of spirit and worked really hard.”“Although we lost, we had a closer match than usual,” senior captain Elle MacAlpine said. “They are a really good team, they won division 2 at Nationals and we won division 3, so it is commendable that we were able to give them a good match.” That being said, they are not untouchable. I think that with all of our returning varsity players next year, we have a good shot at beating them.” The varsity team is mostly young players, so there is promise for next season.Over the course of the season, the girls’ squash team has improved greatly. “Mentally, we were focused, and physically, I think our stamina and our technique were strong, which are all things we’ve been working on,” upper Lizzie Wei said.“You can see the shift in everyone's skills from the beginning of the season and there's been a lot of improvement across the board,” Deguerrera said. ”By the end of the season the spirit has been so high, there's been a lot of teamwork and the new players will probably continue, which is great.” Their skills and spirits have gone up, despite the losses.Among her teammates, Lizzie Wei stood out with a great match, winning against the number one player on Andover. “Lizzie won her match, which was great for her and the team since Andover had some really good girls that we had trouble beating overall,” Deguerrera said.“Lizzie, our number one, played really great,” MacAlpine agreed. “She won, and she is playing on a pretty serious foot injury, possible stress fractures. Plus, she lost to that girl last time, but she came through today!”Deguerrera also commended the efforts of one of their managers, Amy Irvine, who made a big sign for all the seniors on the team. She said that everyone appreciated it so much and wished that the posters could have been up for longer.Overall the girls had a solid end to their season. Everyone played their hardest in their matches, and the season and the sport will be missed by the girls squash players. But the younger girls will miss their seniors. Deguerrera said, “The seniors are definitely going to be missed a lot. We had a good amount of seniors and there were awesome, they pulled things together. They were like glue sticking the team together and they really stepped it up, whether it be on varsity or JV or thirds. The entire team dynamic is going to change next year.”While this might have been the final match of the regular season, the girls look forward to playing in Interschols this weekend. MacAlpine said, “All in all, the girls really gave it their all today, and I believe varsity will do great at Interschols this weekend!”