By Ava Fleckten
Rye High School’s girls tennis team wrapped up their 2024 season with short but exciting runs into the area’s Section 1 tournaments for both team and individual competition.
The Garnets entered the team tournament on Oct. 18 as the No. 3 seed in the four-county section’s local Division I League A, just behind No. 2 seed Scarsdale and top-seeded Horace Greeley. Rye swept the Harrison High Huskies in a quick quarterfinal team match, winning three out of the four doubles matchups and the first of three scheduled singles matches. The first winning doubles match went three sets, 3-6, 6-3 11-9; the second was a 6-0, 6-1 sweep; and the third was a twin of the second, 6-0, 6-1. Rye won the singles match, 6-1, 6-0. Because Rye took four of the seven matchups in short order, the team advanced to the semifinals without having to play the remaining two singles matches against Harrison.
On the semifinal courts, Rye faced off against the defending state champion, Scarsdale High, in an intense, three-hour team match. On the doubles side, senior captains Brooke Gori and Charlotte Lorraine didn’t drop a set, winning 6-3, 6-4. Meanwhile, freshmen Natalie Hofmann and Reese McGill played long and hard to win a super tiebreaker, 6-3, 4-6, 12-10.
So as the three singles matches started, the Garnets and Raiders were tied, 2-2, in the best-of-seven event. Rye senior Sasha Sherman won her singles matchup – but Scarsdale emerged the overall winner by taking the other two singles matches. (Ultimately, Horace Greeley, the league’s No. 1 seed, made it through the local competition to win the Section 1 Division 1 title and advance to the statewide tournament at the U.S. Tennis Association Training Center in Flushing.)
Despite Rye coming up short against the defending state title holder, Head Coach Tony Campbell said he was pleased with the players’ performance at the tournament. “Our young freshmen and sophomores either won or performed brilliantly,” he said, “and the seniors played the best tennis of their high school careers that day.”
Campbell said one of the biggest challenges this year has been the size of Rye’s roster – with far more girls than there are available positions during a team tennis match. Only 11 players total can participate in a match, which consists of four games of doubles and three games of singles, but Rye has an 18-member team.
That hasn’t discouraged the players, however, Campbell said. Each one works hard at every practice and shows up to support her teammates whether or not she’s playing that day, the coach said.
Rye’s varsity A girls team (the school has A and B varsity squads to accommodate the number of talented players seeking to play) exceeded expectations this year, with a team-match record of 10 wins and five losses.
But the Garnets also had some good individual performances in doubles play. The weekend of Oct. 12, three varsity pairs — Lorraine and sophomore Harper Van Maanen, Gori and junior Lana Andikyan, and Sherman and sophomore Alex DiMeo — competed in the area’s Section 1 Individual Doubles and Singles tournament.
All three pairs won their first- and second-round matches on Oct. 13, but the competition in the Round of 16 matches the next day was heated, and only Sherman and DiMeo made it to the quarterfinals – earning the twosome All-Section medals.