Reeham Salah and Andrew Douglas represented the University of Pennsylvania over the weekend as they both competed in the US Squash Championships. Both Douglas and Salah had impressive runs as they each made it all the way to the final where they took second place.
Salah's run to the final comes one week after she became the first Penn National Champion since 1996. As has been the case all year, the junior breezed her way through the draw as she lost just one game en route to the final. In the semi-finals, Salah avenged her 2017 U.S. Women's Championship final loss against Olivia Blatchford. Last season, the two players met in the final where Blatchford won her first title in a five-game, eighty-minute match. Friday's encounter was far less dramatic as Salah took the first two games 11-9, 11-9 and then closed it out in the fourth 11-5.
In this year's final, Salah met Amanda Sobhy for a second career meeting. Last week's national champion was unable to make it back-to-back titles on consecutive weekends as she fell in three games.
On the men's side, Andrew Douglas bounced back nicely after two straight losses last weekend at the CSA Individual Championships. In the first round in what was an all Penn matchup, student defeated teacher as Douglas defeated men's head coach Gilly Lane. The Penn freshman then went on a run in which he pulled off two of the biggest wins of the tournament taking out No. 4 seed Faraz Khan and then top seeded and former champion, Todd Harrity, in the semi-finals.
The 2018 US Men's Championships was a rematch of 2017 as Douglas made his second straight final. However, once again he came up short going down in four games. Douglas lost the first two games before winning the third 11-8. He was unable to force a fifth as he went down 11-5 in the fourth.
The 2017-18 Penn Squash season has come to a close, but keep an eye on Penn Athletics to stay updated as the players compete in individual tournaments throughout the year.
