Coach Steve Smith tried to look on the bright side after his ninth-ranked Ankeny girls’ tennis team dropped a 6-5 decision at No. 8 Johnston on Tuesday.
“We lost under our conference rules, but we would have won 5-4 under the state’s postseason format with six singles and three doubles matches,” Smith said. “I’m not real big on moral victories, but it’s a big step forward to know that we’d be the team advancing if this were the postseason.”
The two teams split the six singles matches. The Hawkettes got a big win at the No. 6 spot from Payton Blume, who was unable to play singles on Monday in a loss to Waukee.
“Payton has been battling injuries all season, but she played great,” Smith said. “After winning her singles in straight sets, she partnered up with Lauren Osburn to win again in straight sets at No. 2 doubles.”
Kira Smith and Madalyn Kolb had Ankeny’s other wins in singles. Kolb then teamed up with Sophie Schmitz for another victory at No. 3 doubles.
“Madalyn took a huge step forward to unlocking her huge potential,” Smith said. “She came back after losing the first set to win in a super close third-set tiebreaker. Then, in her doubles match with Sophie, they dominated the first set before falling behind in the second set. After coming back to force a tiebreaker, they absolutely crushed it in the tiebreaker—not losing a single point!”
The Dragons improved to 2-0 in the CIML Conference. Ankeny’s record dropped to 0-2.
A year ago, the Hawkettes suffered a 10-1 loss to Johnston, which nearly defeated Valley in the quarterfinals of the state team tournament.
“We focused on playing to win rather than playing not to lose in this meet, and we did a much better job of that as compared to (Monday),” Smith said. “We still have a lot of room for improvement, but we also saw a lot of progress.”
Ankeny will play in the Boone Invitational on Friday.
Here are the match-by-match results from Tuesday’s meet:
Johnston 6, Ankeny 5
Singles–Smith (A) beat Christensen, 6-3, 6-1; Gano (J) beat Otto, 3-6, 6-0, 10-7; Hendrickson (J) beat Osburn, 6-1, 6-2; Kolb (A) beat Peterson, 2-6, 6-2, 11-9; Paltrinieri (J) beat Schmitz, 7-5, 6-2; Blume (A) beat Curry, 6-3, 6-4.
Doubles–Christensen-Gano (J) beat Smith-Otto, 7-5, 4-6, 10-8; Osburn-Blume (A) beat Hendrickson-Paltrinieri, 7-5, 6-4; Kolb-Schmitz (A) beat Peterson-Monson, 6-2, 7-6; Curry-Hill (J) beat Rohlfing-Francel, 6-3, 6-2; Ruddy-Veeder (J) beat De Haan-Gorrela, 6-4, 6-3.