PHILADELPHIA, PA – 14th-ranked University of Rochester men's squash bounced back from its Friday evening defeat to top the 18th-ranked Amherst College Mammoths, 6-3, in the Consolation Semifinal Round of the 2024-25 College Squash Association Divisional Team Championships on Saturday at the Arlen Specter Squash Center.
Jake Koeppel got the Yellowjackets on the scoreboard first with a win at the No. 6 spot, topping Grady Herbert: 9-11, 11-5, 11-2, 11-8.
Amherst answered right back to level the match at 1-1 with a win at No. 8, where Matthew Granovsky defeated
Nic Gill: 6-11, 11-5, 11-1, 11-5, but the Yellowjackets would wrap up the opening round with another win and add another to start the second round of play to go up 3-1.
At the No. 2 spot,
Omar Zakaria made it 3-1 with an 11-6, 11-7, 3-11, 14-12 win over Zi Tao Yu, while
Preston Wu swept William Okurowski at the No. 9 spot on the ladder: 13-11, 11-4, 12-10.
Trailing 3-1, the Mammoths would answer back with a win at No. 3, where Joseph Toth edged
Dhirren Rajarathinam, 11-8, 11-13, 11-9, 11-6, to pull within a point, but the Yellowjackets would take the next two to clinch the win.
Tom Whiteley wrapped up the second round of play with a win at the No. 4 spot, edging Flynn Venmore in five games: 8-11, 11-6, 10-12, 11-6, 12-10, to put UR up 4-2. And with a chance to clinch, Yashe Fadte notched Rochester's second sweep of the evening with an 11-5, 11-2, 11-5 win over Abhimanyu Gupta at the No. 1 spot, securing the victory over Amherst.
With UR leading 5-2, each side would score another victory before the match went final, as Graeme Herbert topped
Van Inman-Benavente at No. 7: 7-11, 11-8, 3-11, 11-3, 11-5, while
Arnav Mandhana defeated Fares Khairy at the No. 5 spot: 11-8, 11-9, 3-11, 11-8 to finish off the 6-3 Rochester victory.
With the win, UR now sits at 9-9 on the year, while Amherst drops to 11-10.
The Yellowjackets will wrap up play at the CSA Divisional Championships with the Hoehn Cup Consolation Final vs. #17 MIT at 12:00 p.m. in Philadelphia, PA.
