New Paltz, NY — The State University of New York at New Paltz women's tennis team has faced an intense level of competition in the past week, and that streak will not end this weekend.

SUNY New Paltz (2-1) will send four of its student-athletes to Geneva, NY to participate at the ITA Northeast Regionals, hosted by William Smith College. Senior Trinity Chow, junior Onalee Batcheller, and freshman Anya Barteck are all set to play in the singles bracket, while senior Alexandra Dratch will join doubles partner Batcheller in doubles play. Chow and Barteck, SUNY New Paltz's first doubles team, will also play doubles.

SUNY New Paltz's four representatives and others from top tennis programs in the northeast will represent 64 singles match participants and 32 doubles partners. The entire tournament will be played in a single-elimination format, with first and second round play on Saturday.

Ranked No. 9-16, Chow will face RPI's Krisia Flores in the first round of the singles tournament, while Batcheller will take on the Engineers' Alex Mednikova, and Barteck will get University of Rochester's Camilia Ruiz-Vega. In doubles, Chow and Barteck will face sisters Krisia and Lorna Flores Gonzalez from RPI, while Batchehher and Dratch will draw No. 4 Lily Feldman and Chantel Thongphok from Skidmore College. The winner of each of the singles and doubles regional tournaments this weekend will move on to represent the Northeast in the national championship in Rome, GA on Oct. 14.

Chow enters the tournament after winning her singles and doubles match with Barteck at the Lions' Wednesday and collecting a singles win, 6-4, 6-1 at the Vassar Scramble Saturday. Batcheller, who was named the SUNYAC/PrestoSports Tennis Singles Athlete of the Week last week, went 1-1 in singles play in Poughkeepsie. That included an impressive comeback victory on Saturday where she scored 16 of the last 17 game points to win the match. She is also 2-1 in doubles play with Dratch outside of the Vassar Scramble. 

"​​Onalee never knows when to give," said Hawks coach Rob Bruley. "She's an athlete that will always give 100 percent. It took her a while to assess her opponent's game and to execute her game plan, but Onalee seems to improve with every game."

Barteck did not collect a victory at the scramble, but is otherwise 3-0 in singles play and 3-0 with Chow in what has been an impressive start to her collegiate career.

"Anya is a very mature freshman who has played many junior tournaments," Bruley said on Barteck's fast start. "This has helped her adjust to collegiate tennis. She is going to be a major player in our continued success of the NP tennis program."

While practice has involved all players over the past week, Bruley has mainly focused on working with the four who qualified for the tournament, and preparing them for strong doubles and singles matches.

SUNY New Paltz has qualified student-athletes for the regionals every year, but scheduling conflicts has not allowed the team to participate. With a large portion of the SUNYAC schedule being moved to the spring season, that opened the door for the Hawks to play this weekend for the first time since 2006. SUNY New Paltz went on a run that year, with Dana Lim '09 — who also advanced to the singles semifinals — and Eri Yamakawa '08 moving all the way to the doubles finals before falling to the top seeded Lions, 8-5.

The 2021 Hawks will aim for even better success this weekend.

The tournament begins Saturday with first round singles matches starting at 8:30 a.m., regardless of weather conditions. Second round singles play will begin at 11 a.m. or at 1:30 p.m. if inclement weather pushes all matches indoors. First round doubles play begins at 2 p.m. outdoors or 5 p.m. under the roof.

To view the full singles bracket for the ITA Tournament, click here

To view the full doubles bracket for the ITA Tournament, click here. 

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