South Whidbey top doubles team claims district title

Published 3:51 pm Friday, May 16, 2014

South Whidbey’s first doubles team of Amelia Weeks and Tess Radisch claimed the 1A District 1 girls tennis title after losing a combined four games in the matches Tuesday.

Hosted at South Whidbey High School, Blaine, Friday Harbor, Coupeville and South Whidbey vied for the top two spots in doubles and singles to qualify for the upcoming 1A tri-district tournament in Seattle.

Weeks and Radisch defeated teams from Coupeville, Blaine and their teammates Isla Dubendorf and Bayley Gochanour, who entered the tournament as South Whidbey’s second doubles team.

Their route to the final match was a bit longer than the one taken by Weeks and Radisch. Dubendorf and Gochanour had to bounce back from a first-set 4-6 loss to Blaine’s Gretchen Kordas and Lilly Olason. They recovered and won the next two sets 6-3, 6-2. In the second round, they fended off Friday Harbor’s top team of Maddy Marinkovic and Ashton Timmons, 6-4, 6-4 to reach the final match against Weeks and Radisch, who won 6-1, 6-0.

In singles, senior Colleen Groce entered the tournament after defeating Coupeville’s Rice 6-2, 6-2 in the pigtail match. But Groce was quickly dispatched 6-1, 6-0 by Blaine’s top-seeded Alex Henderson. Groce was eliminated from the tournament in the second round by Friday Harbor’s Yasmin Sarah 6-3, 6-2.

The Falcons’ other singles player was sophomore Kendra Warwick, who narrowly lost in the first round to Coupeville’s Allie Hanigan. After dropping the first set 6-3, Warwick fought in the second to an extra-point tiebreaker before falling 12-10.

She recovered in the second round against Friday Harbor’s Roxanne Borman after losing the first set 6-3. Warwick went on to win 6-2, 6-1 to advance to the finals consolation, where she lost to Nooksack Valley’s Steele, the school’s only player.

A second-place match was needed for the doubles bracket, which included Dubendorf and Gochanour playing either Coupeville’s Jackie Ginnings and Wynter Thorne or Blaine’s Emily Roe and Mandy Hayes.