LADY KNIGHTS BATTLE IN SPRINGFIELD
The Lady Knights tennis tennis team traveled to Branson for the state sectionals and took on undefeated, 16-0 Forsyth. The girls swept the doubles first with Sarena Biria and Mia Sabathy at #1 winning 8-2 and Hope Leathers and Mary Colombo blanking their opponents, 8-0. At #3, Aishi Sethi and Divya Dendi held their court 8-3. In singles, needing only two wins, Sarena and Mary both beat their opponents, 6-0, 6-0.
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Rain forced the match indoors to the Cooper Center in Springfield. The Lady Knights started strong winning 2/3 doubles matches. Sarena and Mia dominated their court against a very strong #1 doubles pair, 8-2. At #2 doubles Hope and Mary rolled to an 8-4 win.
Needing three wins Sarena and Mary won at #1 and #2 courts respectively, 6-2, 6-1 and 6-4, 6-2.
With defeats at court 4, 5 and 6, the match turned to #3 singles.
Hope Leathers played well early to pick up a 4-3 lead in the first set, despite early and repeated bad line calls which prevented Hope from grabbing a bigger lead. Even after a couple of coaches’ conferences with her opponent the bad calls continued. A line judge was called in but the damage had been done in the first set, and Catholic won 6-4. The poor line calls persisted into the second set and warnings were given that included point deductions. Despite this, bad calls persisted and even with penalty points assessed, the bad calls continued. Hope was unable to overcome so many and lost the second set, 5-7. Tennis is a sport that require both courage and integrity, and Hope brought both to this match and represented Barstow so well.
The best is ahead for the Lady Knights as freshmen Sarena Bira and Mary Colombo move on in the MO Class 1 Individual tournament and junior Mia Sabapathy and senior Hope Leathers move on to represent Barstow in the State Doubles tournament.
