The Penn State club tennis team returned to State College on Sunday night after its first-ever trip to the Nationals in Daytona Beach, Fla. The team did not qualify for the gold or silver brackets, but it continued play in the bronze bracket.
Neither the A Team nor the B Team were the top two seeds in their respective pools, which forced them into the bronze bracket.
After four games of pool play, the team with the best record advanced to the gold bracket and the second-ranked team placed in the silver bracket. The remaining teams, which were arranged into two flights of ten teams, competed for the bronze championship.
The A Team finished pool play with a 2-2 record and fell into the bronze bracket after placing third in pool play.
The team beat Johns Hopkins and then competed for third place in the bronze bracket when they played the University of Florida D Team. Penn State lost, and as a result, placed fourth in the bronze bracket.
The B Team finished pool play with a 1-3 record, which also placed it in the bronze bracket. Penn State then defeated Flagler College, but was unable to move on because it still did not compile enough wins to rank as one of the top two teams in the flight.
Carolina Lathrop, a member of the B Team, said that she was satisfied with the team's performance overall.
"We performed well, but we could have done much better if we could have practiced more," Lathrop said.
Lee Frank, a member of the A Team, said practice time was hard to come by with the Penn State tennis facilities being so limited, as well as the weather preventing the team from practicing outside.
"The teams from the South have a huge advantage because they are able to practice as often as they want," Frank said. "We could only practice twice a week, which is not enough."
Frank said the competition was pretty tough and there were a lot of good teams at the tournament.
"I don't think we played up to our potential as far as tennis goes, but we'll improve for next year," said Frank. "I think we made a name for Penn State."
