Middlebury advanced to its second-straight NCAA Quarterfinal with a 5-1 victory over Johns Hopkins in a match played at the Proctor Tennis Courts at Middlebury College. The fifth-ranked Panthers (15-4) will play Amherst on Monday, May 23 at the Stowe Tennis Center in Kalamazoo, Michigan, while 13th-ranked Johns Hopkins finishes its season at 18-5. Middlebury reaches the NCAA Quarterfinals for the fifth time in the program's history, advancing to the semifinals in 2005, as well as the quarterfinals in 2007, 2013 and 2015.
Middlebury swept all three doubles matches, grabbing a 3-0 lead in the first match between the two programs. The Panther duo of Alexandra Fields and Christina Puccinelli picked up the first point at #3 doubles with an 8-1 win over Jody Law and Caroline Greydak. Middlebury's Sadie Shackelford and Kaysee Orozco made the score 2-0 with an 8-2 victory over Megumi Chen and Sunaina Vohra in the second flight. The #1 tandem of Ria Gerger and Lily Bondy completed the sweep with an 8-4 triumph over Johns Hopkins' Ashnaa Rao and Mikey Barthelmass.
In the singles matches, Middlebury picked up their fourth point with a 6-3, 6-4 win at #1 from Gerger over Rao. Johns Hopkins claimed a point when Zou defeated Shackelford in the sixth spot by scores of 6-4, 6-4. Puccinelli clinched the match for the Panthers via a 4-6, 6-1, 6-1 triumph in the fourth spot over Vohra.
The remaining three matches went unfinished. Fields grabbed the opening set by a 6-2 score and was ahead 4-3 at #2 against Chen, while Bondy was up by a set (7-5) and led 3-2 against Law at the #3 spot. Molly Paradies (pictured left) won the opening set in a tiebreaker (7-6 (7)) and was tied with Greydak 2-2 in the second set.