SPORTS

M HOCKEY

COMEBACK KIDS In two games on the road, the Elis defeated Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and Union College, claiming their third and fourth ECAC conference wins. The Bulldogs will hope to extend this streak at the Connecticut Ice tournament this weekend.

TENNIS

SEASON PREVIEW After a productive fall season spent improving skills and building bonds, the Yale men’s and women’s tennis teams look forward to returning to the court and showing o their competitiveness in the quest for an Ivy title.

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YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, JANUARY 28, 2022 · yaledailynews.com

“We just keep putting in the work in practice and in games and nothing changed — just play the right away and play together. It was awesome”

MATT KNOWLING ’24

MEN'S BASKETBALL

Yale Athletics changes fan policies

ATTENDANCE POLICIES

MELANIE HELLER/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

Yale Athletics has issued a number of updates to fan attendance policies that will infl uence all members of the Yale community and a number of winter sports.

BY HAMERA SHABBIR STAFF REPORTER

As COVID-19 cases continue to rise across the country, Yale Athletics updated fan attendance policies on Jan. 12th to go into e ect from Jan. 17 through Feb. 21.

Yale Athletics released changes to their fan policy on Jan. 4 and updated guidelines further last week to flesh out restrictions regarding vaccination status, community attendance and capacity limits. These revisions impact all home games. From the start of the new year until Jan. 17, games were played without any fans in attendance and until in-person instruction resumes on Feb. 7th, undergraduate students will not be able to attend matches.

“It’s a situation we just have to get through and deal with,” Yale men’s basketball forward Isaiah Kelly ’23 said after the Bulldogs’ 96–69 triumph over Cornell. “Hopefully we can get the fans back soon because everybody loves having them there, especially the home games.”

Under the new guidelines, all fully-vaccinated members of the Yale community, except undergraduate students, are allowed to attend games with a 50 percent capacity limit on fan attendance. Photo ID and proof of full vaccination — including a booster, if eligible — are required for entry to games at both indoor and outdoor venues. Unlike the Fall 2021 semester, when masking was not required at outdoor sports, masking is now mandatory for all guests regardless of vaccination status. Concessions will not be sold at any games and children aged 11 or under are not permitted within any venues.

Indoor sports impacted by this change include basketball, hockey, squash, tennis, track and field, gymnastics and swimming and diving. Lacrosse, an outdoor spring sport, will fall under the same rules. While visitors from outside the Yale community are forbidden to enter indoor venues such as Ingalls Rink or the Cullman-Heyman Tennis Center, the rule is not listed for Reese Stadium.

“It is definitely upsetting that we won’t be able to have fans at our matches, especially since most of [the] big Ivy matches fall under this policy,” Women’s squash player Yuliia Zhukovets ’23 said. “Especially after more than a year without any sports, not being [able] to have our parents or at least friends is not the best. But we are defi nitely going into every match with our best attitude and support for each other.”

Womens’ squash joined a host of teams forced to postpone or cancel games due to COVID-19 concerns when Stanford’s squad decided against the cross-country trip for a bout with the Bulldogs. Men’s ice hockey postponed games at Princeton and Quinnipiac originally scheduled for the weekend of Jan. 7-8. The Bulldogs now will face the Tigers Feb. 8 and the Bobcats Feb. 22. Women’s ice hockey pushed back games against Sacred Heart, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and Union to Jan. 18, Jan. 25 and Feb. 8, respectively. Yale womens’ basketball against Dartmouth has been postponed to Jan. 23, while the men’s basketball team had to delay their Ivy opener until their Jan. 15 victory over Cornell. The postponed games against Columbia, Harvard and Dartmouth are now scheduled for Jan. 25, Feb. 9 and Feb. 22, respectively. Men’s’ and women’s fencing were unable to participate in the Penn State Dual Series on Jan. 16 due to complications on the Yale teams.

Some fans expressed discontent with the new rules, including the di erence between attendance pol-

SEE POLICY PAGE 10

Elis jump to 5–1 start in Ivy play

BY ANDREW CRAMER STAFF REPORTER

The Yale women’s basketball team (12–6, 5–1 Ivy) kicked o its seven game winter break schedule with its fi nal nonconference win against Army (8-8, 3-4 Patriot). The squad then opened conference play with a loss at Columbia (13-3, 4-0 Ivy), but recovered with a stretch of fi ve consecutive victories in the games since.

The Bulldogs currently sit in third place in the Ivy League, just one loss behind Columbia and Princeton (13–4, 5–0). Over the break, the Blue and White found di erent ways to win. In comfortable double-digit victories against Army, Cornell (6–10, 1–4), Penn (7–9, 2–2) and Dartmouth (1–16, 0–5), defense was the key as the

W. BASKETBALL

Bulldogs held their opponents to 53 points or less in each of these games.

A rivalry game against Harvard (9–9, 3–3) on Jan. 8 turned into an offensive showcase as the Eli o ense erupted for its highest output of the season in an 80–73 victory. Elles van der Maas ’24 came o the bench to score a career-high 22 points.

“Elles consistently comes off the bench ready to shoot the ball,” teammate Camilla Emsbo ’23 said. “And she knows that she’s an incredible shooter and she’s ready to pull at any time. And that was massive against Harvard. She came in and she took pride in her abilities and she did what she had to do.”

Nine days later, the team found itself in a tied game late against Brown (5–12, 0–5). To make matters worse, Emsbo, the Elis’ leading

SEE W. BASKETBALL PAGE 10

MUSCOSPORTSPHOTOS.COM

The women’s basketball team was kicking o 2022 busy with the start of Ivy League play.

Swain leads Elis to victory

TIM TAI/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

Columbia shot just 38.2 percent from the fi eld in the fi rst as the Bulldogs played their best opening minutes of the season.

BY WILLIAM MCCORMACK STAFF REPORTER

Yale men’s basketball guard Azar Swain ’22 has led his team in scoring enough times this season — in 12 of 17 games heading into the Bulldogs’ Tuesday night game vs. Columbia — that seeing some 20-plus point total next to his name in the box score is no surprise.

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In November, the senior from Brockton, Mass. entered Yale’s 1,000point club. In December, he set what was then a new career-high of 34 points at the Barclays Center, earning a Steph Curry comparison from Iona head coach Rick Pitino. A game later vs. Monmouth, he became Yale’s alltime leading three-point scorer.

During an 83–72 win over Columbia (4–13, 1–4 Ivy) on Tuesday night, Swain added another chapter to a storied fi nal season at Yale (9–9, 3–1), taking the high standards for his performance and raising them a notch. As Yale erupted to an early 20–2 lead within the fi rst seven minutes of play, Swain scored 13 of the Elis’ fi rst 20 points and fi nished the night with 37 points, another new career best.

Guard and captain Jalen Gabbidon ’22 delivered his second consecutive 20-point game in the Bulldogs’ win. Forward Matt Knowling ’24 led the Elis with eight rebounds and four assists and also scored nine points. But

SEE M. BASKETBALL PAGE 10

No. 8 Yale wins 3 straight over break

BY ROSA BRACERAS AND SPENCER KING STAFF REPORTERS

The Yale women’s hockey team (14–4–1, 8–3–1 ECAC) was busy in the early weeks of 2022. In its last fi ve games, No. 8 Yale shook the dust o and continued its competitive play with a record of 4–1.

HOCKEY

The Bulldogs opened the new year with a 4–2 win at Dartmouth (8–13–0, 2–12–0) on Jan. 14, marking the Bulldogs’ fi rst game in more than a month, and the team had to work hard to stay sharp.

“The break from games is defi nitely long but it’s nice to have the time to recharge a bit and get ready for the second half of the season,” said forward Charlotte Welch ’23. “Because we have a uniquely larger team this year numbers-wise, we are able to scrimmage in practice which is super helpful in getting ready for games after a long time o .”

The next day, the Bulldogs stumbled against No. 6 Harvard (14–5–0, 6–2–0), losing 3–1 in Cambridge after beating the Crimson 3–1 earlier this season at The Whale in November.

Harvard scored early in the game with two goals in the fi rst fi ve minutes of play. Shortly after Yale went down 1–0, defenseman Olivia Muhn ’25 was sent to the penalty box for checking. Just 22 seconds later, captain Greta Skarzynski ’22 joined Muhn in the box for tripping. While the Bulldogs attempted to fight off the 5-on-3 penalty kill, the Crimson managed to score the second goal of the night.

Three minutes later, Welch cut Harvard’s lead in half with a backhand shot from the top of the crease that went five-hole. The score remained 2–1 after the second.

After a hard fought second period, Yale pulled goalie Gianna Meloni ’22 from net with less than 90 seconds to go in the game. During the 6-on-5 play, Yale managed to secure fi ve shots; however, their e orts were not enough. Harvard scored an empty net goal with just seven seconds left to solidify the 3–1 loss for Yale.

After the Harvard defeat, the Bulldogs looked to rebound against a Sacred Heart team (10–10–1, 5–4–1 NEWHA) they had already beaten twice: once on the road 7–0 and once on neutral ice at the Nutmeg Classic 4–1.

The Bulldogs looked to rebound against the familiar opponent, and left the ice satisfi ed with a 6–0 win on January 18. The Elis’ offense shined with Kiersten Goode ’24 and Elle Hartje ’24 each scoring two goals.

The Bulldogs shelled the Pioneers’ net all night, ending with 53 shots on goal. Meanwhile, on the defensive end, goalie Pia Dukaric ’25 made 17 saves for her second shutout of the season.

After the 6–0 win against Sacred Heart, the Bulldogs faced fierce competition from No. 9 Colgate (18–5–1, 8–3–1) on January 21. Meloni stood on her head to help secure Yale’s 3–0 win with her fifth shutout of the season after facing a total of 26 shots and shutting down three power-plays.

“The team was really dialed in for the Colgate game and played a

SEE HOCKEY PAGE 10

MUSCOSPORTSPHOTOS.COM

The Bulldogs go 4-1 in the last two weeks with games against Dartmouth, No. 6 Harvard, Sacred Heart, No. 9 Colgate, Cornell.

WEEKEND

DOJA CAT AND HER THREE STOOGES:

UNDERCOVER IN THE UNSEEN HOURS

// BY LAURA ZENG

You can tell a lot about a person by their email sign-off. The first time I corresponded with Logan Ledman ’24, I was treated to a Malcolm Gladwell quote about success. After we went back and forth a bit over scheduling, Joe Wickline ’24 inserted a reference to Julia Child’s penchant for onions with no semblance of pretense. Nader Granmayeh ’24, “the most outwardly-facing-normal” of the bunch, made no conspicuous indications of quirk, but he was also the first one I interviewed.

The premise of this article was to profile three guys who started a radio show on WYBC entitled “The Unseen Hours, Featuring Doja Cat,” where Doja Cat is a perennial guest who keeps on flaking. And either the show goes viral and Doja — whom the group refers to as Ms. Cat — actually makes an appearance, or the bit continues. It becomes abundantly clear after tuning in to an episode about Michael Bennet and Persian music, however, that Ms. Cat is just a MacGuffin. Like a Horcrux or a briefcase, she’s a plot device driving the narrative, an arbitrary choice of conceit — Nader even admitted to confusing her with Dua Lipa. So what’s more interesting than their supposed fixation with her is instead their actual obsession with each other — or, to put it more gently, the nuances of their friendship dynamic. But how best to understand the tenor of such a relationship?

This is the tale of my attempted infiltration into a friend group. No one likes to be the desperate outsider trying to worm their way into inside jokes, “proving their vibe.” But in my case, the pretense of journalistic integrity provided the perfect cover, allowing me to don the role of inquisitive antagonist. As a reporter, my purported aim was to learn more about their show. In actuality, my goal became to get them to acknowledge their absurdist premise. It would have no value if I got it immediately, however; rather, I needed to earn it first for the win to have any meaning. They needed to know I was buying into their bit, operating on the higher plane of comedic intellect, before I could even try to get them to break. Ultimately, of course, the score didn’t matter as much as playing the game.

Since I’m not a comedian myself, nor the quickest on my feet, my greatest asset would be catching them offguard. Throughout this process, I interviewed several people surrounding the friend group, including Philip Mousavizadeh ’24, a close friend of Nader’s, and Phil Schneider ’24, the other roommate who “probably has the most life away from the rest of the group.” I gathered as much ammunition as I could: prying into ex-girlfriends, burner Twitter accounts, obsessions with Olivia Rodrigo, run-ins with the law and other antics, along with keywords and key questions like “how has your relationship with your belt changed during the pandemic.” Armed as such, I met with each individual one-on-one before confronting them all together.

*** Logan, Joe and Nader met their freshman year, serendipitously placed in the same Trumbull suite and fro-co group. What perhaps started out as a friendship of convenience and proximity — as firstyear relationships often do — turned out to be genuine compatibility. They currently live together in the same suite, except for Logan, who lives in a single down the hall — “down the hall” being a mere geographic technicality. They also work at the buttery, eat in the dining hall, go to the gym, talk about girl problems, and now do this show, together. They live, laugh, and love — together. Imagine Seinfeld adapted for the Yale campus, and you’ll have a pretty good portrait of their energy. Joe stars as a taller and lankier Jerry; both perform stand-up and present as a central figure, and not just because Joe was sitting in the middle of the couch when I met up with the three of them. Nader is equivalent to George, sharing not only the height and glasses but also quiet neuroticism and a history of female troubles. Logan leans into being Kramer, the “slightly kooky” guy literally down the hall, encapsulating distinct yet sociable quirkiness.

I would say I was most prepared for Nader, my first interview. Most of my intel did pertain to his private life in particular, and I think the Cont. on page B2