Girls tennis team fails to advance in Team Regionals; Individual Regionals next

The Clear Lake girls tennis team wrapped up its regular season and jumped into post-season play last week.  The Lions have concluded team competition for the season, however, Individual Regionals will be played Thursday, May 19, in Waverly.

CL 6, H-D 3

The Lions hosted Hampton-Dumont to start the week and came away with a 6-3 victory.   The Lions picked up victories in five singles matches to take the early lead on Thursday, May 12.  Number one player freshman Maranda Harrison easily defeated Gabby Tielke, 8-1, with her solid play.  Senior Jassmine Rucker and Bailey Goldberg followed suit to take 8-6 and 8-3 wins.  The final singles victories came from the play of seniors Kristi Peterson, who won 8-1, and Lainey Arians, who defeated her opponent 8-4.

The doubles team of Rucker and Harrison kept up the pressure with strong net play to defeat Tielke and Bella Siems 9-8 (7-5 tiebreaker). Seniors Alexa Julsen, and the number two doubles team of Arians and Peterson and number three team of Philomena Schnoebelen and Kortni Savage all had close matches as they finished out their season.

“These girls have worked hard all season and really stepped up today to get the job done,” said Coach Mary Jo Peterson.

Decorah Tournament

After a full day of competitive tennis, Clear Lake placed third out of six teams at a tournament held in Decorah at Luther College.

In both doubles and singles play, a round-robin shortened format, based on the number of games won, was used to calculate overall rankings.  Every player competed in a minimum of 10 matches for the day, in which every point and game was crucial.  Clear Lake finished with 21 team points behind Decorah, with 45 points, and Waverly with 31.  The Lions outscored Osage (20), Oelwein (13), and Charles City (7).

Overall singles rankings placed Clear Lake’s Gretchen Jones third at number one singles.  Kiersten Baalson was fourth at number two singles; Chloe Mueller placed third at number three singles; Reagan Brackey placed third at number four singles; Maddy Brant placed fifth at number five singles; Ali Witt tied for fourth at number six singles.

Overall doubles rankings placed the team of Jones and Baalson third  at number one doubles; Brackey and Mueller third at number two doubles; Brant and Witt fifth at number three doubles.

All-Academic Team awards were also given to juniors and seniors with a 3.5 GPA or higher.   Clear Lake senior Reagan Brackey, along with juniors Ali Witt and Kiersten Baalson, received this award.

An All-Tournament Sportsmanship Award was voted on by team members from all six teams.  Clear Lake’s Kiersten Baalson was honored.

“Kiersten is an excellent role model and embodies all the positive characteristics of sportsmanship,” said Coach Mary Jo Peterson.

Team Regionals

Team Regionals were held Saturday, May 14, in Waverly.  In Round one, Clear Lake topped Aplington-Parkersburg, 5-1.

Chloe Mueller’s easy victory over AP’s Jessica Heffner, 6-0, 6-1 got the Lions on the right track.  Gretchen Jones relied on steady play as she defeated Korrigan Hippen, 6-2, 6-2 to increase the Lion lead to 2-0.  Seniors Reagan Brackey and Maddy Brant helped contribute to the first round match as they both battled through tiebreakers in their first sets. Brackey dominated in her second set to finish 7-6 (8-6), 6-0.  Maddy Brant also refused to give up and finished strong, defeating Maddie Waller 7-6 (7-5), 7-5. The final point of the day came from the play of junior Ali Witt.  Witt overcame a first set deficit and refused to give up, eventually defeating Jenna Bruns 5-7, 7-5 (11-9 Super tiebreaker).  This secured the first round win for Clear Lake.

In Round  two, the Lions were defeated by Waverley-Shell Rock, 5-0.  Scores were:

Chelsea Poesch (W-SR) def. Jones, 4-6, 3-6

Madi Overman (W-SR)  def. Baalson, 0-6, 3-6

Krissy Weir  (W-SR) def. Mueller, 1-6, 0-6

Ashlyn Hughes (W-SR) def. Brackey, 0-6, 3-6

Hannah Folkerts (W-SR) def. Brant, 5-7, 2-6

Katie Wichman (W-SR) def. Witt, 4-6, 5-4(Inc.)