North Stars nearly sweep St. Charles East
The North Stars came within a doubles set of running the table Tuesday afternoon as they ventured across town to take on St. Charles East in the Upstate Eight Conference opener for both teams.
But despite her team's overwhelming success, after the match St. Charles North coach Eve Tubman's mind was on the one that got away.
"That was a hard loss," Tubman said.
It was a hard loss in a big match between St. Charles East's Erin Bowman and Lexi Baltes, and St. Charles North's Alecia Natale and Jenna Bell. The battle of No. 1 doubles teams was the only match of the day to go three sets after the Saints dropped the opener, 6-7 (5), but rallied to win the second, 6-4, and split sets.
"We just needed to keep our heads in the game and stay consistent," Bowman said.
With momentum on their side, the Saints dashed to a 4-1 lead in the decisive set. But unforced errors opened the door for the North Stars to stage a comeback, and two games later the score was 4-3.
"If you're going to win just one match, you want to win at the top, so that was a big one for us," St. Charles East coach Sena Drawer said.
Bowman took the ball and quickly served the Saints to a 5-3 advantage, but Bell answered for the North Stars, leaving it up to Baltes.
"I didn't want it to go to another tiebreaker, it had been a really long match already," Baltes said.
It wasn't easy, but the St. Charles East senior served out the 6-4 win.
"It was a match of momentum swings," Baltes said.
The North Stars swept the singles matches, led by Liselot Koenen's 6-1, 6-1 win over sophomore Catey Esler.
"My serve was on today, and that helped," Koenen said. "(Esler) is a really good player and it was a nice match."
Freshman Brittany Plaszewski topped Claire Haffner, 6-0, 6-0 at No. 2 singles, and Sarah Amalraj beat Jessica Gatehouse, 6-0, 6-1. "We had some players who played well today, but I still have a page of notes of things that we need to work on," Tubman said.
The doubles matches were a bit more closely contested, but except for the top one, they all broke the North Stars' way.
Lauren Drawbridge and Carly Dutkiewicz fought back a nice second set effort by Erin Reilly and Sam Baginski to win the No. 2 doubles match, 6-2, 6-3. Kris Wolverton and Ashley Randazzo swept by Alyssa Payleitner and Claudia Morency, 6-1, 6-0 at No. 3, and Stephanie Smith and Kate Lesswing got better as their match went along and beat Clara Shelton and Sam Hagedorn, 6-3, 6-1.
"I didn't have my best lineup out there today, and we have a lot of work to do," Drawer said. "I think I saw a couple of things come together today, and we can build on that."
The North Stars are now 1-1. The Saints fell to 1-2.