Wayne Christian turns back Wayne Country Day
By Rudy Coggins
Published in Sports on September 11, 2009 1:47 PM
Lisa Peacock tucked away her racquet.
"How did you do?" a friend asked.
Peacock told her score and quickly added "she was really good."
Wayne Christian senior Samantha Reaves defeated Peacock and secured the first singles point in overcast, windy conditions on the Wayne Community College courts Thursday afternoon. Teammate Blake Govan, a freshman, quickly followed with a victory as the state-ranked Eagles cruised past county rival Wayne Country Day 8-1 in the first of two meetings this season.
"I'm proud of them," said WCDS coach Joann Logan. "We have such a young team and we're going to keep fighting. Wayne Christian has a good team and they deserved to win."
The Eagles captured five singles matches.
Third-seeded Savannah Sutton, an eighth-grader, logged an 8-0 decision over the Chargers' Katherine Roethling. Seventh-grader Taylor Willman turned back eighth-grader Meredith Roethling 8-4.
Top-seeded Brooke Barfield stopped WCDS freshman Sarah Best 8-2. The two played an elongated opening game that took nearly 10 minutes to complete.
"Sarah's match was definitely not indicative of the score," said Logan.
Mack Thompson seized the Chargers' lone point. The sophomore built a 6-3 lead only to see eighth-grader Faith Sutton climb within 6-5. Thompson regrouped, consistently kept the ball in play and pulled out an 8-5 decision.
"Mack is our team captain and she has got a lot of fight," said Logan. "She has a great attitude out there and is a good sport. She pulled out a key match yesterday (Wednesday) and today she played within herself even though she got down a little bit."
Wayne Christian (7-0 overall) swept the doubles. Barfield-S. Sutton, F. Sutton-Reaves and Govan-Willman combined to lose just six games.
Eagles co-coach Dana William applauded her team's effort and commended the players for adjusting to the windy conditions.
"In practice before the match, we hit against the wind and with the wind," said Willman. "I told them to be conscious of how they were hitting the ball and how it was affecting their shots. The wind does affect your play. They adjusted and were able to pull it off.
"I think Wayne Country Day has really improved from last year. We had some really good points with them. They're a young team like we are and I think it will be a good rivalry going forward."
WCDS fell to 2-3 overall.