The Eagles pulled off a rarity with a clean sweep of Muncie Central in the opening round of the Delta Girls' Tennis Sectional on Wednesday afternoon.
Delta won all five matches 6-0, 6-0 for a 60-0 sweep in total games.
This has happened only a handful of times in Coach Cleland's long coaching career at Delta. It is difficult to pull off because every game starts over again at love-love and all it takes is a momentary lack of focus resulting in a couple of your errors and then a strong shot from the opponents and suddenly you can give up a game even if you're the dominant player.
The top evidence of that is Delta's No. 2 doubles team of seniors Rowan Hinds and Elizabeth Bamidele. Even though they are an amazing 21-0 this season and have not dropped a set, the 6-0, 6-0 victory at sectional was their first 6-0, 6-0 win of the entire season!
Two players reached career victory milestones. Senior Kate Manor collected her 90th career varsity win. Junior Alexa Bratton gained her 60th career varsity win.
Fifteenth-ranked Delta improved to 16-2 for the season and will face rival Yorktown at 4:45 p.m. today (Thursday) for the sectional championship. Delta will seek its 15th consecutive sectional title.
The Eagles beat Yorktown 5-0 during the regular season during the annual SmashCancer match. However, the Tigers pushed the Eagles at times in three of the five positions.
Yorktown advanced with a 3-2 victory over Muncie Burris in the semifinals.
COMPLETE RESULTS
DELTA 5, MUNCIE CENTRAL 0
Singles
- Sophie Crabtree (D) def. Grace Walker, 6-0, 6-0
- Olivia Marshall (D) def. Maeve Quirk, 6-0, 6-0
- Stella Sieber (D) def. Emma Jennings, 6-0, 6-0
Doubles
- Kate Manor / Alexa Bratton (D) def. Kennedy Smith / Amaya Stoudmire, 6-0, 6-0
- Rowan Hinds / Elizabeth Bamidele (D) def. Briell Barbosa / Viviana Cruz-Martinez, 6-0, 6-0
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