After a week in Boca Raton, Fla., for Spring Break, the Syracuse tennis team is a little tanner and much more confident.

‘We pretty much slammed our opponents,’ freshman Wei-Ming Leong said. ‘We expected them to be better.’

The Orangewomen shut out Miami (Ohio) and Dartmouth, 7-0, on Tuesday and Saturday, respectively, and defeated Southern Illinois, 6-1, on Thursday. Of the 27 combined singles and doubles matches SU played, it lost only three.

Perhaps Syracuse anticipated stiffer competition. While Southern Illinois and Miami came in with sub-.500 records, Dartmouth had the same 4-4 record that the Orangewomen had a week earlier.

Syracuse surprised its unsuspecting opponents with strong stamina in the Florida sun and a revamped doubles game.

Syracuse head coach Mac Gifford knew that arriving in Boca Raton three days before the first meet would help SU prepare for the heat, sun and outdoor playing conditions.

‘It was clear that one of the big factors of the whole week was who was going to handle the sun better,’ Gifford said. ‘It was uncommonly hot, like 90 degrees. So I tried not to beat them up too badly for practice.”

Other head coaches, like Dartmouth’s Bob Dallis, took a different approach and paid the price.

‘He told me they were going out twice the day before we played them,’ Gifford said.

Syracuse appreciated the chance to play in great weather.

‘It’s different playing outdoors,’ sophomore Kristine Bech Holte said. ‘You have to be more consistent.’

Like Holte and senior doubles partner Daniela Kaluskova. On March 2 against Cornell, Gifford grouped Holte with Kaluskova for the first time. When the tandem won, 8-5, over the Big Red’s Kate Sternberg and Mollie Edinson, Gifford decided to keep the pair together for the following meets to see if their win was a fluke.

It wasn’t.

Holte and Kaluskova’s three victories last week were instrumental in the Orangewomen’s doubles success, Gifford said.

Syracuse’s singles play was equally successful. SU lost only one match and allowed just three matches to reach the third set.

More so than the wins, SU enjoyed relief from the Syracuse weather.

Said Leong: ‘Everybody likes sunshine better than snow.”

Published on March 18, 2003 at 12:00 pm