HomeArticlesHarrow Sports College Squash Player of the Week (1/31/2011)

Harrow Sports College Squash Player of the Week (1/31/2011)

[powimage] Northampton, MA — For the week ending 1/31/2011, Annie Madeira (University of Pennsylvania) and Naishadh Lalwani (Yale University) have been named the women’s and men’s [hpow].

A [hpow] should have a significant impact on his or her team’s performance during the prior week and demonstrate sportsmanship. Coaches and Sports Information Directors may nominate players by contacting Michael T. Bello. Nominations are due each Monday by 6 PM ET.

As the season progresses, selection of the [hpow] continues to get tougher.  There were phenomenal individual performances that benefited teams, such as Amherst’s Andrew Kriete’s comeback over Williams’ Will Morris, Rochester’s Oscar Lopez’s comeback from an 0-2 deficit and five match balls against Dartmouth’s Fletcher Pease, or the continued strong play of Harvard’s first-year player Gary Power.  In addition, Cornell’s Jaime Laird demonstrated outstanding sportsmanship in her win over Dartmouth’s Valeria Wiens. Laird’s victory clinched the 5-4 win by Cornell. Shaheen Madraswala (Mount Holyoke) went 4-1 last week, with wins against Bowdoin, Middlebury, Hamilton, and Colgate. Wellesley’s Cara Kaufman had one of the strongest matches of her career against Connecticut College and continued her winning streak with a victory over Northeastern.

The similarities between the men’s and women’s [hpow] are great. They are both team captains, clinched a crucial victory for their teams against Princeton, dropped the first game, and won in four.

Madeira (Penn)Annie Madeira (University of Pennsylvania): Penn travelled to Princeton on Thursday. The two top-five squads had an intense match.  Princeton was up 4-1, but Penn stormed back and tied it at 4-4.  The final match of the evening was the #3 match between Princeton’s Libby Eyre and Penn’s senior captain Annie Madeira.  Both players are graduates of Episcopal Academy and had faced each other numerous times.  Despite dropping the first game 4-11, Madeira remained calm. She captured the next three games to propel the Quakers to a 5-4 victory. After the match, Madeira quickly deferred the credit to a team victory, stating that she was just one of five Penn student-athletes to pick up key victories against Princeton.

Lalwani (Yale)Naishadh Lalwani (Yale University): Princeton visited Yale on Saturday. The 3rd-ranked Tigers were looking to upset the 2nd-ranked Bulldogs. The match was extremely tight and tied at 4-4 with Princeton winning positions 1, 2, 5, 6 and Yale winning 3, 7, 8, and 9.  The #4 match featured Yale captain Naishadh Lalwani and Princeton’s Peter Sopher.  With all of the matches concluding while the number 4 match was in its first game, the focus was on Lalwani and Sopher. To add a little pressure, Lalwani’s parents flew in from Bombay, India to watch their son play, the first time they had witnessed their son playing in a Yale uniform. Like Madeira, Lalwani lost the first game; however he rebounded and won the next three games to lead Yale to a 5-4 victory.

Photos courtesy of the University of Pennsylvania and Yale University.

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