Despite building an early 3-1 lead, the 25th-ranked Navy squash team (8-3) fell a handful of points shy of upsetting #17 MIT (7-6) Sunday morning in Charlottesville, Va., as the Engineers picked up a 5-4 win over the Mids.

Match Highlights
• MIT struck first with senior Yos Wagemans sweeping (11-1, 11-6, 11-6) Holden Woodward (Fr / Richmond, Va.) at the #9 position
• Navy, however, answered with three-consecutive wins, including a hard-fought match between Alexander Orr (So / Haverford, Pa.) and MIT sophomore Bobby Albani at #5 ... Orr jumped out to a 2-0 lead, but Albani forced a fifth and final game after picking up wins in games 3 (11-7) and 4 (11-9) ... Orr regained the competitive edge and sealed the win with an 11-7 game 5 victory
• Sean Wu (Fr / Princeton, N.J.) played one of his strongest matches in a Navy uniform to date, taking a 3-0 decision (11-6, 17-15, 11-8) over sophomore Mitav Nayak at #7
• Matt Wang (Jr / Malvern, Pa.) secured a win at the #1 spot for the Mids ... Wang and Mero Elmarassy, a rookie, split the first-two games before Wang took control, winning games 3 (11-6) and 4 (11-4) to improve to 6-4 this year
• MIT put together a string of three-consecutive wins (#2, #3, #4) to take a 4-3 lead over the Mids with 2 matches remaining
• Ramsay Killinger (Fr / Wyndmoor, Pa.) found himself in a 2-0 deficit before collecting an 11-7 win in the third game against MIT grad student Matt McManus at #8 ... McManus was in the midst of rallying and held a 10-4 advantage in the fourth game when he suffered an injury that prevented him from finishing the match and in turn gave the Mids the match-tying win
• The final match of the day saw Tighe Mullarkey (Fr, So / Locust Valley, N.Y.) face senior Nikhil Kakarla at #6 ... Kakarla took game 1 by an 11-8 score, but Mullarkey knotted the match with a 14-12 win in game 2 ... Kakarla, however, went on to win the match with wins in games 3 (11-6) and 4 (11-7) to give the Engineers the team victory

• As the first half of the season comes to a close, 6 of Navy's 9 players have 7 or more wins with Ramsay Killinger atop the leader board with a 9-2 record ... Alexander Orr and Sean Wu, meanwhile, have recorded 8-2 records, while Matthew Kang, Tighe Mullarkey and Lucas Spiro (Jr / Buffalo, N.Y.) own 7 wins apiece

What's Ahead
• Navy will be off the rest of the month to focus on final exams and observe the holiday break
• The Mids will return to action Jan. 5 when it travels to Middlebury, Vt. to battle #20 Middlebury (5:00 pm) at the Bostwick Family Squash Center. The first of three matches that weekend, Navy will also play at #11 Williams (Jan. 6 / 12:00 pm / Simon Squash Center) and at #18 Amherst (Jan. 7 / 11:00 am / Davenport Squash Courts)

MIT 5, Navy 4
1 | Matt Wang (N) def Mero Elmarassy (MIT) // 11-8, 5-11, 11-6, 11-4
2 | Philip Hyun Su Price (MIT) def Henry Sparkman (N) // 12-10, 11-5, 11-6
3 | Collin Wen (MIT) def Lucas Spiro (N) // 11-9, 11-8, 11-9
4 | John Gunton (MIT) def Matthew Kang (N) // 11-0, 11-5, 11-7
5 | Alexander Orr (N) def Bobby Albani (MIT) // 11-8, 12-10, 7-11, 9-11, 11-7
6 | Nikhil Kakarla (MIT) def Tighe Mullarkey (N) // 11-8, 12-14, 11-6, 11-7
7 | Sean Wu (N) def Mitav Nayak (MIT) // 11-6, 17-15, 11-8
8 | Ramsay Killinger (N) def Matt McManus (MIT) // 4-11, 9-11, 11-7, 4-10 ret.
9 | Yos Wagenmans (MIT) def Holden Woodward (N) // 11-1, 11-6, 11-6

### Go Navy ###