CMS Women's Tennis Falls 5-3 to Pomona-Pitzer in SCIAC Finals

CLAREMONT, Calif. - Nikolina Batoshvili won in both singles and doubles to help the top-ranked Claremont-Mudd-Scripps women's tennis team to a 3-1 lead, but third-ranked Pomona-Pitzer came from behind to capture a 5-3 win over the Athenas on Saturday afternoon at the Biszantz Family Tennis Center.

The loss drops CMS to 22-1 on the season and snaps a 45-match winning streak, which dated back to a loss to Chicago in the ITA Indoor Championship in March of 2023. Pomona-Pitzer moves to 17-5 on the season and earns the SCIAC's automatic bid to the NCAA Division III Championships, the first time a team other than CMS has earned that distinction since 2011. 

CMS went ahead by taking the final two doubles matches, with Sena Selby and Audrey Yoon earning an 8-6 win at No. 3, and Batoshvili and Alisha Chulani picking up an 8-5 win at No. 1. 

Batoshvili won a 6-3, 6-3 decision at No. 6 singles to put the Athenas ahead 3-1, and Nyakiri Kanefu was able to answer back with a 6-3, 6-4 win at No. 3 singles to close the gap to 3-2. Pomona-Pitzer was able to swing the momentum with a pair of tiebreaker wins at the top two lines, where Angie Zhou, the defending national singles champion, won an 8-6 decision at No. 1 and Lauren Rha took a 7-5 tiebreaker for the first set at No. 2. 

Zhou and Rha went on to win their second sets 6-3 to put Pomona-Pitzer in front, and Leticia Bazua finished off the win with a three-setter at No. 5. 

CMS will still be one of the favorites in the upcoming NCAA Division III Tournament, when it will try to win its third straight national title. The Athenas will find out the site of their regional when pairings are announced on Wednesday.