A young girls tennis team will take the courts this year at Dunlap High School. With about five seniors graduating last year, Patrick Gornik, girls tennis coach, is expecting the younger players to step up.
“We don’t have a huge group of seniors, but they’ll have a chance to step up and show our younger girls how to play,” he said.
Last year, the girls tennis team ended their season third in conference, behind Morton and Metamora. They also had a doubles team qualify for State, winning one round but losing the second.
“To get to go to State and win a round is pretty good for teams in the area,” Gornik said.
Gornik is unsure how the season will go this year, but is confident his players will help each other.
“Over the summer we’ve had on average of about 15 kids at our practice. That’s pretty good numbers. We got about eight or 10 that it’s really their first year playing,” he said.
Although the team is fairly young, Gornik is expecting great things from many of his younger players.
“I expect a lot of great things from Nahee Parks, our freshman that will play one or two for us. Molly Mathes, she was second team all-conference last year as a freshman,” he said. “All my other seniors that have been there, they’ve been coming to all the practices.”
Mathes has been keeping up with her play throughout the year to stay sharp for the upcoming season.
“We’ve had our summer practices, working with the incoming freshmen and we’re going to have some freshmen that have been playing for a while and even if they haven’t, they’ve been doing great,” the sophomore said.
“I think we’re going to have a pretty good season. It’ll be tough because we lost four or five seniors last year, and we’ll have to work harder, but we’ll do pretty well.”
Gornik said the important part is that his players have been coming to summer practices and want to improve.
“It’s all about just getting out and playing and getting into the tournaments. Playing against your teammates and getting ahold of your teammates during the summer (is important),” he said.
The girls tennis team officially begins practice today. Their first match is Aug. 24 at home.
