CROOKSTON GIRLS’ TENNIS BEATS WADENA-DEER-CREEK, FALLS TO DETROIT LAKES IN DL TRIANGULAR

The Crookston Pirates Girls’ tennis team split a pair of duals falling 5-2 to Detroit Lakes in a non-Section match before bouncing back to beat Wadena-Deer-Creek 5-2 in a Section 8A match played in Detroit Lakes.

CROOKSTON VS. DETROIT LAKES
The Pirates faced a tough test against Section 8AA Detroit Lakes. The Lakers were led by Brina Smith who won a hard-fought match that required 22 tie-breaker points before Smith was able to defeat Hayden Winjum. “Detroit Lakes is a tough opponent,” explained Crookston head coach Mike Geffre. “They’re very deep and have a lot of good girls at every spot. They Hayden Winjum match is an anomaly. She won the first set pretty easily and was up 1-0 in the second set, but after that point, it was just a weird thing.” Catherine Tiedemann provided one of Crookston’s two wins in the dual, topping Shelby Busker 6-1, 6-1 in second singles. “She rebounded nicely in that one, she sort of had control from start to finish in that match so that was a nice win for her,” explained Geffre. The Pirates other win came from the first-doubles team of Emma Osborn and Emma Borowicz, who won their match 7-5, 6-2. “That was a nice victory for them,” noted Geffre. “They were actually down 5-2 in that first set but won five straight games to win that first set. That’s a nice competitive thing because you battle, you battle, you battle and then you turn the tables and actually win the second set quite easily.” Perhaps the best match of the dual came in 3^rddouble were Emma Gunderson and Hannah Lindemoen battled against Detroit Lakes’ Siri Vagle and Chloe Will with the Pirates falling 6-7 (5-7), 7-6 (8-6), 11-9. “That was a three tie-breaker match,” said Geffre. “That doesn’t happen very often. That was about as close as it could be. It was a day of a lot of tie-breaks. It was a really competitive match.”

CROOKSTON VS. WADENA-DEER-CREEK
The Pirates bounced back from their loss to Detroit Lakes with a dominant showing against Wadena-Deer Creek. The Pirates swept the three doubles match and took the third and fourth singles matches as well. Hannah Street dominated her match 6-4, 6-0. Halle Winjum delivered a very strong showing winning over Kaylee Ova 6-0, 6-1. Emma Osborn and Emma Borowicz didn’t concede a single game in their match. “They competed very well together,” said Geffre. “Together they’re two pretty good athletes and make for a very good doubles team.” Eden Haller and Elysa Christensen played well in route to a 6-0, 6-1 victory. Audrey Harbott and Hannah Lindemoen rounded out Crookston’s strong second dual victory taking their doubles match 6-2, 6-1. “With Wadena-Deer-Creek, their second and third doubles are really inexperienced in those spots and we were a little bit more experienced in those spots,” explained Geffre.