Batavia makes most of rough weather day
Hannah Potter and Kaitlin Mills began their first day at this year’s state tennis tournament just like everyone else.
They waited.
And then they waited some more.
Poor weather conditions delayed the start of the first round matches until the early afternoon. By then, it had already been a long day.
“We got here at about 8:30 (a.m.), and around 10 they told us to go and come back at noon,” Potter said. “It was a lot of waiting around, so it was good to finally get out and play.”
Once the Batavia duo finally took the court, Potter and Mills got into the kind of groove that made them one of the state’s top doubles teams this year, winning the opening round against Mandy Kent and Kayla Wilson of Dixon, 6-0.
“We had to pump ourselves up after waiting so long, and just stay consistent with our shots,” Mills said. “It really came together for us in the first set.”
Kent and Wilson found their game a little bit after that, but still did not prove to be too much of an obstacle as Potter and Mills closed out the second set, 6-2.
“We wanted to stay focused, and we let a couple games get away, but they were good games,” Potter said. “We just wanted to get through it and finish it.”
And that was the end of their day. The revised plan for Thursday had been to play one round in the championship bracket and one in the consolation. But as the weather turned sour — again, some first-round matches and most consolation matches had to be suspended. Late in the day, the back draw was canceled altogether.
Batavia’s Jennifer Mizikar and Amelia Cogan’s first-round match against Naperville North’s Kamile Stadalninkait and Abbie Boswell was one of those that had to be suspended midway through the second set after Stadalninkait and Boswell came from behind to win the first, 7-6.
On the singles side, Miranda Grizaffi, who won two matches at state last year, beat Fenwick’s Mia Sullivan, 6-3, 6-2.
“After winning those matches last year, I think Miranda knows what it takes to get to the next round,” Batavia coach Brad Nelson said.
Liza Fruendt overcame a 6-3 first set loss to Ali MacDonald of Mundelein and won the next two, 6-3, 6-2.
“I was really glad to see her bounce back after dropping that first set,” Nelson said. “We’ve seen her do that many times.”
At the moment, Batavia is sitting in a tie for third in the team standings. But the loss of the back draw could severely impact their opportunities as a team.
“It’s really a big disappointment for everybody, but especially for teams like ours,” Nelson said. “We felt that we had a team that could earn lots of points off the back draw. Now we just have to focus on winning the matches before us.”
St. Charles North was one of those teams that was impacted by the elimination of the consolation matches.
While Brittany Plaszewski cruised by Mimi Latronico of Pekin, 6-1, 6-0, to advance to a second-round match against Morgan Park’s Darnesha Moore, the North Stars’ doubles team of Kate Lesswing and Ashley Randazzo couldn’t get past Kristy Hamilton and Jackie Altansarnai, a 5-8 seed from Hinsdale Central.
West Aurora sophomore Emily Stefancic struggled against the elements and a strong effort by Kankakee’s Charisma King, who won the opening set, 6-3.
“Emily wasn’t moving very well in the first set, and she made a lot of errors,” West Aurora coach Brian Brooks said. “Second set, she started adapting to the weather.”
That weather included heavy wind gusts that made every lob shot an adventure. But Stefanic managed to limit her mistakes, play her game a little more, and won the second set, 6-3. She then jumped out to a 4-0 lead in third set before the rain returned and forced the match to be suspended until Friday morning.
Kirby Einck finished ahead of the last wave of rain. In fact, the Geneva freshman’s 6-1, 6-0 win over Tiffany Cheng of Peoria Richwoods was one of the earliest first-round matches in the books. Einck will play Jacqueline Baum of Highland Park in the second round.