This past weekend, the Villanova Club Tennis team held its annual tennis tournament at the courts on West Campus. The tournament took place on Saturday, April 22nd and Sunday, April 23rd from 1p.m. to 5p.m. 

  Five other schools came to the tournament: Drexel University, Penn State, Princeton University, Stockton University and St. Joe’s University. However, there were a total of nine teams playing the tournament because Drexel, Stockton and Villanova had entered two teams to play in the tournament.

  During the tournament, many fans, including family, friends and other teammates, came to watch. Even though Villanova only had 23 players in the tournament, many club team members still came out to watch their teammates compete. 

  The club tennis Tournament Director, Catherine Taubner, was in charge of coordinating and planning the event. 

“We have been playing this tournament since the beginning of the semester, so it was very exciting to see it all come together,” Taubner said. “Villanova Club Tennis usually hosts at least one tournament a semester, so we wanted to continue this tradition. Also, everyone loves playing, and having a tournament is a great opportunity to play on Villanova’s campus, which has many amazing courts to play on.

  “We first decided on the dates and times the tournament would be and ended up choosing to have a two-day tournament so we could play more matches,” she said. “We reached out to schools to see if they were interested in coming to play, and any school that wanted to come was welcome. Once we had the teams that were coming, we focused on other details, such as food, rosters and format.

  “On Saturday, we will be playing a ‘Fast 4 format,’ with three rounds,” Tauber said, discussing the format of the tournament. “This means that each match will be the first to win four games, and each school will play three other schools on Saturday. Every round will consist of one men’s and one women’s singles matches, one men’s and one women’s doubles matches and one mixed doubles match. 

“Based on how every team does on Saturday, they will be placed in one of two brackets to play in on Sunday,” Taubner said. “The matches on Sunday will be a six-game set. The winner of each round is the team that has won the most games.”

  Since Villanova had two teams in the tournament, they were placed in different pools of the bracket. On Saturday, Villanova’s first team won its pool with St. Joe’s, Penn State, Stockton and Drexel. However, Princeton won the other pool with the other teams for Villanova, Stockton and Drexel. 

On Sunday, Princeton won the finals over Villanova, 23-15. Penn State came in third place and Stockton came in fourth. The winter was determined by the number of games that each team won during their matches. 

Even though Villanova had lost to Princeton, the tournament was a great opportunity for players to compete against other schools and it was a lot of fun to cheer on teammates over the past weekend.

  Follow the Villanova Club tennis team on Instagram @villanovaclubtennis to stay up to date with more tennis events and matches.