The Crawfordsville Girls Tennis Sectional got underway at the Wabash College Indoor Courts on Tuesday as the North Montgomery Chargers and the Lebanon Tigers squared off in a re-match of the regular season where the Tigers were 4-1 winners. Learning from that match and playing their best tennis of the season as of late, the Chargers gave the Tigers a fight but ultimately saw their season come to an end with a 3-2 loss.
Freshman Kate Merica won her match at three singles vs Lucie Cassis 6-0, 6-0 and the two doubles team of Caelyn Carpenter and Avery Gayler were able to win in a tie-break 6-3, 2-6, 10-8.
“I was very proud of the way played against a good Lebanon team,” Charger coach Lori Guard said. “One doubles could’ve been the point that could’ve flipped our way because it was really close especially in that first set. Our two doubles team it seems have played so many three set and close matches for basically the last week at least and along with them and Kate they’ve been the two spots that we know we can get wins from. That experience is very valuable for those girls.”
Lebanon’s Ava Lehmkuhler defeated the Chargers Sydney Neideffer 6-0, 6-2 at one singles, Bianca Coronado was a 6-1, 6-1 winner over Abigail Allen at two singles and as Guard noted the one doubles team of Shayna Ratcliff and Reagan Little were defeated by the Tigers Breanna Page and Kathryn Williams 7-6 (3), 6-3.
The season ends for the Chargers with an overall record of 6-9 which is a step in the right direction from where the team was a year ago. With a majority of the team returning for next season, Guard is looking forward to continuing to progress and also looked back on the season that was for her team while thanking her two seniors in Ratcliff and Neideffer.
“These girls are so coach-able and they took what we worked on in practice and translated it to the courts,” Guard said. “We got beat but we didn’t beat ourselves. I think last year and earlier this season we were beating ourselves a lot. To see the momentum that these girls have started to build in the ladder half of this season has been so fun to watch. It takes a while to learn the game of tennis and the leaps and bounds that we made was unbelievable. I can’t thank both Sydney and Shayna enough and we’re going to really miss them. Their talented players and they brought great leadership with them this year. They’ve set a great example for the rest of these girls to carry forward.”
With everyone else returning and a year of varsity experience for Merica and Carpenter as freshman under their belts, the Chargers and Guard are looking like they’ll be a tough out for when the season rolls around next spring.
Lebanon advances to the semi-finals where they’ll take on Crawfordsville. In the other semi-final Western Boone and Southmont will square off.
