For the third consecutive season, the Dike-New Hartford girls tennis team has qualified for the Class 1A team state tournament. They defeated St. Edmond 5-0 in Saturday’s 1A Region 7 Final at Byrnes Park to advance.
The Wolverines had some close battles, but won each completed match without having to advance to doubles. At #1 singles, Addy Joslin won 6-1, 6-1. At #2, Lauren Muller battled for a 7-5, 6-1 win. Haley Badker came back after dropping the first set at #3, winning 1-6, 6-3, 10-1. Payton Foster won every game at #4, taking the match 6-0, 6-0. In what proved to be the clinching match, Autumn Meester came away with a 7-5, 1-6, 10-5 win at #5. Tareya Johnson was in a tiebreaking set at #6 when the dual ended.
“This is amazing accomplishment,” Head Coach Reegan Zinkula says. “From the very beginning, obviously this is everyone’s goal, but to top it off, we didn’t even have to play doubles, and all three rounds to get to a state we didn’t have to play doubles at all. So that goes to the girls. They’ve come out focused, ready to go, and left it all out on the court. They had some awesome battles here today. St. Edmond is a very good team, and we ended up coming up on top, which is awesome.”
DNH navigated the entire regional bracket without dropping a match, with 5-0 wins also happening in both the first round and semifinal.
The state tournament will be at Caldwell Park in Pella. The Wolverines will take on Spencer in a first round dual on Monday, October 6 at 9:00 a.m. For the first time, all four first round duals will be held at the same location, with the semifinals happening later that day. The championship and third place duals will be on Tuesday, October 7.
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[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=einodNXmpZs?si=t1SZniu4i51bMenX&w=560&h=315]
