August 23, 2016

Southwest Cowgirls playing host to the Southeast Lady Falcons

With their courts being resurfaced only after a year worth of promises, the Lady Falcons traveled to the lush pastures and parking area adjacent to the Southwest Tennis Complex to play what I like to think as the most unheralded game. 

Playing our full line up minus one, the Cowgirls could only remember back to our one play date last season.  Though handling the Falcons a 7-2 loss then, with our 4 seniors exiting last season and lots of new faces to the top 6, the Cowgirls weren’t too sure what they were going to come up against.

Kyra Akande court 1

Mai Vo court 2

Sam Hamrick 3

Meghan Whalen 4

Katelyn Leinbach 5

Kristen Taylor 6

In short, the Cowgirls ran the courts.  Though the Lady Falcons put up valiant efforts, the Cowgirls were able to jump ahead claiming straight victories on courts 2-5.  Court 6 featuring Ms Taylor proved a bit more complicated.  Her court featured a very talented young Falcon who challenged Kristen on return of serve and baseline play.  Though it took her a couple of warm up games, Kristen eventually pulled ahead and closed it out 10-4.

On court 1, Kyra too took a couple of games to warm up with her opponent in close pursuit until in the 7^th game of the match, Kyra breaks the Falcon’s serve, not once, but twice going up a total of 4 games.  Not to be outdone, the Falcons didn’t break down in her play, rather, slowing but up momentum, one game at a time and clawed her way back into contention and eventually the win.  Though a heart breaking loss on court one, I could only applaud the Falcon’s effort of hanging in the points and subsequent games in her win.

5-1

Kyra’s marathon match took so long, the #2 and #3 dubs had almost finished their matches before the #1 dubs took to the court.

Dubs

1 – Vo/Hamrick

2 – Gretchen Cross/Zakeyia Clarke

3 – Johaina Apolinario/Maria Tawhid

Cross/Clarke were the first dubs team off the courts handing the Falcons another loss.  Truly the match was tighter than the score suggests.  The first couple of games were just feeling each other’s play out as they did battle against the Falcon’s 2 and 3 players.  Going down but once, 4-5 the Cowgirls settled down, held their serves, broke the Falcon’s serve and will and continued with their 8-5 win. 

Apolinario/Tawhid – Tawhid’s first opportunity to play in a varsity match – played very well against the Falcon’s 4/5 team.  Long arching rallies painted a beautiful picture of the type of match it was.  Understand Johaina isn’t the tallest player we have, but her verve of attacking the net paid off big as Maria handled things from the baseline taking the win 8-1.

On court 1 for dubs action against Hamrick/Vo, the Falcons started with a fiery launch eventually going up 4-0 in their race to 8.  Having settled down, Hamrick’s placements and Mai’s consistent shots brought back the Cowgirls 1-4, 2-4, 3-4, 4-4, 5-4.  5 unanswered games.  But the Cowgirls rested on their accomplishments and the Falcons took back a break, Cowgirls now down.

5-6

6-6

7-6

And serving for the match the most dreaded of all things happened to the Ccowgirl server, not just one, but two double faults.

7-7

8-7

Another double fault

8-8

A tiebreaker (race to 7 by two)

0-1 - down

1-1 - tie

2-1 - up

3-1 - up

3-2 – still up

3-3 - tie

4-3 - up

4-4 - tie

4-5 - down

5-5 - tie

6-5 - up

6-6 - tie

6-7 – down

6-8 a well played match that quite honestly, could have gone both ways through the entire match.

Though a small disappointment on the court, great play was commented on by both coaches in the dubs match.

Cowgirls close the match out 7-2 and raise the record to even 3-3 on the season.

Cowgirls travel to Trinity on Thursday for a rematch of a 5-4 win from last week.

Erica Lane (SE) over Kyra Akande (SW) 10-8

Mai Vo (SW) over Stella Arnesan (SE) 10-0

Sam Hamrick (SW) over Calli Medlin (SE) 10-0

Meghan Whalen (SW) over Jaylyn Sams (SE) 10-0

Katelyn Leinbach (SW) over Rebecca Oster (SE) 10-0

Kristen Taylor (SW) over Lauren Skerlak (SE) 10-4

Lane/Kirsten Braxton (SE) over Vo/Hamrick (SW) 9-8 (8-6)

Cross/Clarke (SW) over Arnesan/Medlin (SE) 8-5

Apolinario/Maria Tawhid (SW) over Sams/Oster (SE) 8-1