ECC 3A tennis: Eventual champs start slow, find rhythm

By Rudy Coggins
Published in Sports on October 9, 2014 1:48 PM

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rcoggins@newsargus.com

PIKEVILLE -- Ashton Walker, Brennan Dove and Elizabeth Sutton shared one common denominator Wednesday afternoon -- a slow start.

And each, as expected, found their respective rhythms and walked away from the Luke Vail Tennis Courts as the newly-minted Eastern Carolina 3-A Conference girls' tennis champions in singles and doubles play.

Charles B. Aycock's Walker defeated Southern Wayne's Hope Jones 6-1, 6-0 in the singles final. Eastern Wayne's Sutton-Dove protected their No. 1 seed with a highly-contested 6-3, 6-2 triumph over the Golden Falcons' tandem of Casie Belom-Cassidy Coerver in the doubles title tilt.

The six finalists punched their tickets to the N.C. High School Athletic Association eastern regional, which begins Oct. 17 at Barton College in Wilson.

Sutton-Dove played close to the vest during the early stages of their opening set against Belom-Coerver. The Golden Falcons' duo led 3-2 after the second changeover until Sutton-Dove applied some advice from head coach Craig Hassell.

"He just said to stay focused, stay calm and try to get every ball back," Dove said. "Don't worry about hitting it really hard and trying to get winners all of the time."

Sutton-Dove started working the angles a little more and capitalized on unforced errors by Belom-Coerver. Once they found a better rhythm, Sutton-Dove closed out the match by winning 12 of the final 14 games.

"We just have good chemistry," Dove said.

Jones broke Walker's serve in the opening game of their championship final. Walker answered back with a service break of her own and reeled off 12 consecutive games to claim her 18th victory of the season in 19 tries.

Southern Wayne head coach John Fonvielle encouraged Jones to switch her shots and slow the tempo to prevent Walker from finding her rhythm. The strategy induced a few unforced errors until Walker boosted the pace of the match.

"I wasn't playing aggressive at first," Walker said. "(I) just had to settle down, loosen myself up and go for my shots -- play my kind of tennis. I think I turned it around about the third game.

"Hope is a super nice player. She gets to a lot of balls that other girls wouldn't so I have to keep playing and go for a little bit bigger (shot), but not too much."

Jones defeated Aycock's Kassidy Pitchford 6-1, 6-0 in semifinal-round play. The score was misleading since the two played a grueling match that was punctuated by long rallies with each player forcing the other to play each side of the court.

"I think I got a little tired as the match went on," Jones said of the final. "I just kind of, I don't know, got a little winded and was not able to make as many shots as I did in the beginning. When playing Ashton, you've got to hit more (shots) in than she can hit in, return everything you can ... stick with it.

"She's good."