Tennis Wrap: Concord Claims Regional, Chargers Show Strong
The Concord girls tennis team continued an amazing postseason push Thursday night at the Northridge Regional.
Krystal Grubb, at the same venue, continued an amazing prep career too.
Concord blanked Central Noble 5-0 to claim the program’s first regional title in 25 years. The Minutemen, who beat league foe NorthWood two nights earlier to avenge a regular-season loss, advance to the Homestead Regional Saturday. Concord (13-2) will meet No. 2 ranked and defending state champion Indianapolis Cathedral (19-1) at 10 a.m.
Grubb extended her unbeaten senior season in impressive fashion as she captured the No. 1 individual singles championship. The Elkhart Memorial standout topped Fairfield junior Morgan Mast 6-3, 6-1.
Concord earned three dominating straight sets wins Thursday night to hand the Cougars just their second loss of the season.
Regan Landis won 6-4, 6-0 at No. 2 singles for coach Jan Soward’s squad and Maya Klopfenstein notched a 6-2, 6-0 win at No. 3 singles for the champions. Concord rolled at No. 2 doubles as Allison Murphy and Meaghan Godzisz prevailed 6-0, 6-1.
Alana Brubaker posted a 5-7, 6-1, 6-1 win on the No. 1 singles court for Concord. The Minutemen completed the shutout as Keegan Thursby and Emma Westlake won 6-1, 2-6, 6-2 at No. 1 doubles play.
Grubb, who lost in the state quarterfinals of the No. 1 singles tourney a year ago, improved to 23-0 on the season and 48-1 the past two seasons. The IUPUI recruit also moved her career mark to 86-9, the same record her older sister Katie posted at Memorial. Katie, a 2009 Memorial graduate, went on to play at Bowling Green.
Mast concludes her season at 21-3. She was 25-0 a year ago at No. 2 singles for the Falcons.
The Memorial program will be well represented at the LaPorte Regional June 3.
The Chargers’ No. 1 doubles team of Maggie Dickerson and Layla Jojo also claimed a sectional title at Northridge Thursday night. The duo topped Anna Pope and Kaitlyn Margraf of Jimtown 6-3, 6-2.
Dickerson and Jojo will play at LaPorte next Saturday, as will Grubb.
South Bend St. Joseph blanked Penn 5-0 to win the LaPorte Regional title Thursday night. The No. 7 Indians, who are 22-1, will face Warsaw (14-3) Saturday at noon in the Culver Academies Semistate. Warsaw beat Plymouth 3-2 Wednesday night to win the regional title at Culver Academies for the second straight year.
The Indians beat the No. 24 Kingsmen for their third straight regional crown and seventh in the last 10 years. St. Joe won in convincing fashion with straight set wins at all three singles positions. The lone three-set match was at No. 2 doubles.
Penn finishes its season at 17-5.
St. Joe defeated Warsaw 5-0 in last year’s semistate matchup.