Just kidding.
We’ve got one more shuffle for the Durango High School girls tennis team.
Freshman Sarah Harrelson beat Jamie Wanzek in a challenge match Thursday to capture the No. 2 spot for Friday afternoon’s dual match against Grand Junction.
Then, she got the closest of any DHS player to capturing a win in the Demons’ first match in weeks with a full lineup. When the Demons lost 7-0 to the Tigers on Friday, Harrelson at least took her match with Anne Hughes to a tiebreaker.
Harrelson lost 6-3, 7-6 (7-5).
“I’m so happy,” said Harrelson, who’s playing tennis this season for the first time after taking a year off. “It’s just fun to be out here.”
Consistency was the killer.
When Harrelson’s rocket of a serve was on, it was on. Good luck with that return, Hughes.
“When it works, it’s pretty good,” she said with a head cock and a dose of irony.
On the other hand, good luck with the double faults, Harrelson.
Same went for the punchy backhand: hello points; hello net.
“I usually slam the ball, and it doesn’t work out for me,” Harrelson said. But “backhand is definitely my thing.”
Hughes’ thing, on the other hand, was just simple consistency. And while Harrelson was able to make some good runs to make the match nearly two hours long, the even keel won out in the end.
“Very proud of her,” DHS head coach Laura Ehlers said of Harrelson. “She really kept going for her shots until the very end.”
So did No. 1 single Erin Neale, only her opponent, Carolena Campos, hit them better. Neale met her mirror image in a match that featured crowd-pleasing rally after rally.
But Campos stole a page out of Neale’s playbook, forcing her back on the backline and limiting her space to smack returns.
“We play the exact same way,” said Neale, who lost 6-1, 6-2. “I felt like I was playing myself. It really gets in your head.”
That and the C word, again.
“She was more consistent. She would just wait for me to make a mistake, and I would,” Neale said.
Ehlers said that lack of consistency – which has been a macro-level problem with the Demons’ doubles teams switching partners over and over because of absences, illnesses and injuries – was the micro-level problem that also kept them winless Friday.
Wanzek lost her match 6-3, 6-4 to round out the singles, then the doubles got swept:
No. 1 team Meredith Nass and Kit Hackett lost 6-1, 6-2.
No. 2 team Anna Wright and Rachel Redders lost 6-2, 6-3.
No. 3 team Hannah Liberman and Jenni Snowberger lost 6-0, 6-0.
No. 4 team Rachel Cooper and Eva Eckstein lost 6-1, 6-0.
The Demons will wrap up their season with a dual against Fruita Monument at 10 a.m. today at the DHS tennis courts.
“Beat them,” Harrelson said of her last-match goal. “I have to win one; it’s important to me.”
jsojourner@durangoherald.com
