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Covenant girls tennis wins state title

Covenant’s Briana Boland concentrated on her breathing. With the pressure mounting and needing to win one more game to grab a victory, Boland just slowed things down.

 

“We worked on our breathing and just relaxed. We had her breathe for the 90 seconds we have for the change over,” said Covenant coach Dave Dahnert.

 

It worked, as Boland closed out the match with an 11-9 victory that sealed a state title for the Eagles. In a nail-biting match Covenant defeated Hampton Roads Academy 5-4 to win its first ever Division II State Championship in girls’ tennis.

 

The squads started off the day in doubles and the number one doubles matchup was Covenant’s Corinne Jennings and Eleanor Lee against HRA’s Joyce Fields and Pia Stuetzle. Fields and Stuetzle quickly took care of their matchup 10-3, giving HRA one point in the doubles matchups. However, Covenant’s lower seeded players took care of business in the doubles play to secure the other two matchups giving Covenant a critical 2-1 advantage going into the singles round.

 

Coming out of a team huddle, head coach Dave Dahnert announced to the girls that they only needed to win three of the six matchups to claim the title.

 

HRA looked to stop that as Fields dominated her matchup with Jennings 10-3. However, senior Emily Dahnert continued to roll off of her impressive doubles performance and defeated HRA’s Emily Wang 10-1.

 

“This has been a long time coming for [Dahnert] and she’s been a part of a great team these last four years,” coach Dahnert said. “To watch her defeat the girl she did at number two was great.”

 

Hampton Roads rolled in games three and four leaving it up to the lower seeded matchups. Hayley Fox defeated Erica Bellamy 10-3 making it 4-4 going into the final matchup.

 

Matchup five had Boland taking on Jasmin Colson of HRA. By the time the other matches had ended and the crowd had shuffled around to the final matchup, Colson held a 9-6 lead over Boland. As the focus turned to her match, Boland began her comeback.

 

Every point was a battle, every ball was a threat returned in hopes of the opponent making a mistake. Boland’s persistence and shot placement kept Colson on the move. Boland eventually knotted the match up at nine, then won the next game to give her the lead 10-9 leaving just one game between Covenant and a state title.

 

“We said ‘whatever you’ve been doing for these last couple games, do it to close it out.’,” Dahnert said. “We really didn’t have to give her any tactical tips to do on the court, we just had her relax.”

 

With Dahnert’s advice and some regulated breathing during the break, Boland stepped back onto the court and closed out the final game, winning 11-9. She let a smile slip out as she was met by the Covenant fans seconds after clinching Covenant’s title.

 

“A lot of teams in girls tennis are really strong at the top, usually one and two, maybe one, two and three. These folks were really consistent today with Hampton Roads. We knew our bottom of our lineup was going to deliver the victory, that’s where it was going to come down to,” Dahnert said. “Corinne Jennings playing one for us all season as a freshman has taken the brunt of the really good players from the other teams but we knew the bottom of the lineup with Hayley Fox and Bri Boland and Eleanor Lee was going to do it for us.”

 

They did just that as the Eagles ended up with the hardware in the end.

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