For the first time in 41 years, when they defeated San Marino for the Division 3-A title in 1977, the Girls’ Varsity Tennis team won the Division II CIF Southern Championship.
The team had their first round of CIF on October 31st, with an away game against Brentwood, winning with a score of 14-4. They won their second round match, 13-5, two days later against Redlands High School. Thereafter, they defeated Claremont High School in the Quarterfinals 10-8. In the Semifinals, the girls won 11-7 against Poly Long Beach. Finally, the team triumphed against Aliso Niguel 13-5 at The Claremont Club to capture the Division II title.
Co-captain Sophie Mckenzie (12) said,“If you asked me a year ago how far we would get in CIF, I would’ve said maybe we would win one round. Like last year, we won the first round of CIF, and had lost in the first round pretty much every year before that, so I was super happy. And then this year, we come out and win the whole thing. So I’m just really proud of all of us.”
Co-captain Solenn Matuska (12) also commented, “I’m feeling ecstatic! Honestly, at the beginning of this season, I knew we were good, but I never expected that we would get this far and even this morning I wasn’t so confident that we would actually win this whole thing and so that fact that we did is amazing.”
Co-captain Ashley Chun (12) added,“I’m so proud of us getting this far. We haven’t gotten to the finals since 1977, which is insane, and the fact that we were able to pull 13 games in the finals is absolutely crazy.”
All three co-captains have been on the team since freshman year and are beyond happy with how the team finished off their season. Looking to the future, they have high hopes for what LC’s tennis has to offer.
Pleased with this year’s victories, Coach William Moravec is extremely pleased with his team and all the hard work they put into this year.
“We’ve always had to play Division 2 in CIF which is really tough and everyone this year has really contributed to the team as a whole, so I couldn’t be happier!” he said.
Ashley finished,“I think this will provide a lot of motivation for the other kids on our team because now they know that if they work hard, then they can get to this point again.”
