After both Crawfordsville and Fountain Central tennis captured sectional championships last week, the Athenians and Mustangs were looking to advance in the Regional Tuesday at Crawfordsville. The Athenians would get a re-match with Greencastle while the Mustangs would take on Terre Haute South.
Earlier in the season CHS and the Tiger Cubs battled with Greencastle besting the Athenians. On Tuesday with the match being tied at 2-2, it would come down to No. 1 singles between Samantha Rohr and Madelyn Landry. After losing the first set 7-6 (6), Rohr stormed back to force a winner take all set three with a 6-1 set two win. Unfortunately for the Athenians Landry would go on to seal the Regional win for the Tiger Cubs with a 6-3 set three win as CHS was defeated 3-2.
For the Mustangs they would face the toughest competition they had seen all season with the Braves. While showing a lot of fight ultimately FC would fall to the Braves 4-1 and see their stellar season come to an end.
Athenians fall in re-match with Tiger Cubs
While CHS did fall to the Tiger Cubs, it wasn’t for a lack of trying as Crawfordsville battled all night long. The two wins for the Athenians came at both doubles spots with Cathleen McGrady and Lilly Klingbeil defeating Liberty Amis and Isabelle Monnett 6-2, 6-1. Elyse Widmer and Mia Wagner at two doubles took care of Addison Fowler and Savannah Black 6-2, 6-2.
The win by McGrady and Klingbeil advances them into the individual state tournament. The duo will play the winner of Northview and Covington on Thursday.
Along with Rohr’s 6-7 (6) 6-1, 3-6 loss at one singles, Reese Minnette fell 3-6, 4-6 at two singles to Caroline Gooch and Harmony Taylor was defeated by Greencastle’s Sophia Riggle 4-6, 4-6.
“It was a bummer that we fell a little short tonight,” Crawfordsville coach Kara Amundson said. “Hopefully the loss will get Sam ready for next year. I’m proud of Cathleen and Lilly for getting to move on and I’m sure they’re pumped to continue their season.”
Crawfordsville’s season includes the county title, a second place finish in the Sagamore Conference, and getting to add another sectional title to their trophy case. Along with McGrady and Klingbeil both being seniors, Crawfordsville will also graduate Minnette and Taylor. The Athenians end their season with an overall record of 11-6.
Mustangs see stellar season come to an end
Fountain Central gave a tough Terre Haute South team everything they could handle, but it just wasn’t in the cards for the Mustangs as their season was ended by the Braves.
The lone win for FC came at two singles as Haley Webb defeated the Braves’ Samhita Shantharam 6-0, 6-2. Senior Lillie Fishero suffered her first and only loss of the season at one singles as she fell to freshman Sarah Rowe 1-6, 3-6. At two doubles the Mustangs saw Marylee Muniz and Hannah Prickett fall 2-6, 1-6 to Sydney Williams and Jordan Miller.
Both three single and one doubles went three sets for FC. Emily Jiminez and Alydia Mellady after dropping the first set 3-6, rallied back to win set two 6-3 before dropping the third and final set 3-6 to Savannah Semmler and Ayden Zinkovich.
Angela Gonzalez was able to take set one over Briley Ireland 6-4, before dropping set two 3-6. The two would go into a tie-break to decide a winner with Ireland coming away with a 10-8 win.
Mustangs coach David Kight gave the Braves credit as they gave FC their most difficult match of the season.
“From top to bottom, that’s the best team we’ve faced this year,” he said. “Their freshman at one singles against Lillie was super impressive to watch and I’m not sure there’s much more Lillie could’ve done. It’ll say 4-1 in the score book, but the matches were a lot closer tonight. Haley did a great job of getting us on the board fairly quickly. Angela played probably about as well as I’ve seen her play this year and to get a set off of their three singles girl was very impressive. Lastly our one doubles played by far their best set of the season to force a third set. Overall we played about as well as we could have.”
The Mustangs end their season with a mark of 16-2. In it they were named the Bi-county and WRC champions along with capturing their first sectional title since 2017. Despite the season coming to an end, Kight noted how this team will be mentioned among the best in school history.
“We’re going to reference this team when we talk about some of the best to ever do it here,” he said. “Lillie and Hannah both won 22 matches this season and it was a great season all around. More importantly than the record and winning the sectional, I got to be around a great group of kids and it was the best two hours of my day after school to get to be with them.”
FC will graduate three seniors in Fishero, Gonzalez, and Jimenez. Muniz will be the lone senior for the Mustangs next season with Prickett and Melladay still being just sophomores next year. Webb will join Muniz as the two upper class men by becoming a junior so the future for the Mustang tennis program looks to be in great hands.
DeSmet falls in individual singles tournament
North Montgomery's Carlie DeSmet got to play in the individual singles tournament after winning her match at one singles last week against Parke Heritage.
DeSmet was matched up against Seeger's Addison Shrader and would see her season come to an end with a loss to Shrader.
"Carlie came up against some very tough competition today, but continued to fight till the end," North Montgomery coach Lori Guard said. "She served extremely well and fought for points at the net. Shrader is a great player and we wish her well in the individual tournament moving forward. I'm so proud of how our entire team played this season and while it was sad to see it end, we're excited about the future."
