CBA - Triton tennis
By Rudy Coggins
Published in Sports on September 8, 2011 1:49 PM
PIKEVILLE -- "Where did I go?"
Brooke Barfield asked herself that question while she nearly squandered a four-game advantage late in the opening set against Triton's Cailin Goff on Wednesday afternoon.
Up 5-4 after losing her second straight game on serve, Barfield dropped her racquet and met Charles B. Aycock head coach Brad Matthews at the fence.
"He told me to get back focused," said Barfield.
Barfield, a junior, reeled off seven consecutive games and handed Goff a 6-4, 6-0 loss at No. 1 singles. The straight-set decision helped the Golden Falcons ground the Hawks, 9-0, on the Eastern Carolina 3-A Conference tennis scene.
Aycock (9-0 overall, 5-0 ECC) continued its best start in league play since 2006 -- the last time it won a regular-season conference championship. The Golden Falcons beat the Hawks (2-2, 2-2) for the second time this season.
Tied at 1-1 in the first set, Barfield rolled to a 5-1 lead. The transfer from Wayne Christian quit moving her feet, started reaching for balls and failed to capitalize on Goff's errors.
Consecutive double faults on serve allowed Goff to pull within 5-4 and serve to extend to opening set.
"I just got frustrated with myself and let her come back," said Barfield. "It's just a mind game. I just had to stop making simple mistakes."
Goff struggled with her first serve and couldn't match Barfield's groundstrokes in the second set. Forehand and backhand shots constantly dropped into the net or sailed either wide or long, which enabled Barfield to earn three service breaks on the way to her ninth win of the season.
Fellow Golden Falcons Ashton Walker, Katie Gurley, Brittany Parrish, Misty Edwards and Caroline Bone each collected a singles point. Walker logged a shutout at No. 2 singles. Gurley (No. 3) and Parrish (No. 4) each lost one game.
The tandems of Barfield-Walker, Gurley-Edwards and Parrish-Bone completed the sweep in doubles.
"Our goal today was to improve all of our scores from the last time we played them and we did," said Aycock head coach Brad Matthews. "We started a little slow, but really played extremely well in the second sets.."