By FRED KRONER
Mahomet-Seymour Girls’ Tennis
Every Mahomet-Seymour entry in the Danville Class 1A girls’ tennis sectional tournament won at least one match, and both of the Bulldogs’ doubles’ teams qualified for state.
Thanks to the points provided by the six M-S competitors, the Bulldogs earned their first-ever sectional team title in girls’ tennis. Entering the completion of the tournament’s final two matches – both of which feature the Bulldogs – M-S has accumulated 22 points and runner-up Urbana has 16 points.
Each school could add as many as three additional points on Monday, but it won’t affect the team outcome.
The Bulldogs’ No. 1 doubles’ unit, Savannah Amatyleon and Emily Young, opened the sectional with a 6-2, 6-1 conquest of SJ-O’s Lily Rice and Caroline Aden and then dominated a quarterfinal showdown with Schlarman’s Teresa La and Evy Kelsey, 6-1, 6-0, to reach the semifinals.
On Saturday, they swept past Urbana’s Lorelie Yau and Eisla Madigan, 6-0, 6-4, in the semis to secure a berth in the finals.
Due to inclement weather, the championship and third-place matches will be contested on Monday (Oct. 16). The M-S duo of Amatyleon and Young will face another Urbana entry, Alisa Tangmunarunkit and Luna Morales.
Amatyleon and Young are 13-4 for the season and qualified for state for the second year in a row. They are the first two tennis players from M-S to reach state more than once.
The Bulldogs’ other sectional doubles’ entry, Adella Bird and Holland Martin, swept past two opponents on Friday (Oct. 13), first decisioning St. Thomas More’s Lauren Waldhoff and Luciana Grant, 6-0, 6-2, before posting a quarterfinal triumph over St. Joseph-Ogden’s Ellie Ward and MaKenna Hamilton, 6-0, 6-1.
That improved their record to 17-0 for the season, establishing a school record for wins by an M-S doubles team in one season. They also forged a school record for most consecutive wins in a season.
However, in the semis, Bird and Martin were bested by Urbana’s Tangmunarunkit and Morales, 6-4, 7-6.
In Monday’s third-place match, they will take on the Tigers’ Yau and Madigan.
The semifinalists in both doubles and singles automatically qualified for state, which will start on Thursday (Oct. 19) in suburban Chicago at various locations. Buffalo Grove will serve as the host school.
There will be 64 singles’ competitors and 64 entries in doubles at state.
In singles, Emmie Flores recorded a 6-3, 1-6, 7-6 triumph over SJ-O’s Addison Ross before suffering a season-ending loss in the quarterfinals to Uni High’s Ramanath Kruthi, 6-0, 6-0, the eventual sectional champion.
The Bulldogs’ other singles’ competitor, Claire Johnson, posted a first-round win over Paris’ Shelby Fry, 6-4, 7-5 and then was eliminated by state-bound Anna Houpt, from Danville, 6-0, 6-0, in the quarterfinals. Houpt finished second in the singles’ draw.
Flores finishes the year with a record of 9-4. Johnson ends the season with a 12-5 mark. Johnson and Martin (12-1 record) shared the Bulldogs’ team lead in singles wins.
M-S was 11-2 in dual meets this year, setting a school record for team wins in a season. For all matches this season, the Bulldogs had a cumulative record in singles of 68-23, a winning percentage of 74.7 percent.
Fourteen different squad members played at least one varsity match in singles and all 14 earned at least one victory.
In doubles, the cumulative record for the nine different pairings the Bulldogs used this season is 44-8, a winning percentage of 84.6 percent. All nine of the M-S doubles units won at least one match.
Sixteen of the 25 rostered players won at least one match this season, either in singles or doubles or both.
