PERHAM EDGES CROOKSTON GIRLS TENNIS IN SECTION SEMI-FINALS

The Crookston Pirate girls’ tennis team battled hard all day, but lost to a tough Perham team, 4-3, on Thursday afternoon in the Section 8A girls’ tennis tournament semifinals at the Crookston High School tennis courts.  “These types of matches are good character builders, win or loss,” said Pirate Coach Cody Brekken. “I have no qualms about today. The girls came out, they battled tough and Perham brought their game today. Up and down the lineup, Perham played really well. The girls played tough. Once the match stays close for a longer period of time, we’re the higher seed and the pressure is on. It just got tense, and couldn’t close on some of the close matches.”

Crookston took a quick lead with Hayden Winjum winning at first singles 6-2, 6-3.
Halle Winjum gave Crookston a 2-0 lead with a 6-1, 6-2 victory at second singles.
Perham got their first win at third singles when Mallory Belken beat Crookston’s Brekken Tull 6-0, 6-2.
Perham tied the match at 2-2 with Grayce Mickelson and Maya Radniecki beating Crookston’s Halle Bruggeman and Macy Fee 6-4, 6-4.
Crookston regained the lead when Emma Osborn and Emma Gunderson won their second doubles match 6-4, 6-4 to give the Pirates a 3-2 lead.

FINAL MATCHES –
The last two matches on the court were first doubles and fourth singles. Both were nail biters and both finished at about the same time. In first doubles, Crookston’s Tiedemann and Borowicz won the first set 7-6 and 8-6 in the tiebreaker. Perham won the second set 7-5 to force the third set.  It was a back-and-forth battle in the third set as the two teams battled, but it was Perham that came away with the 7-6 victory with a 7-5 tie-breaker to win their match.

The fourth singles match had a great matchup of Crookston’s Hannah Lindemoen and Perham’s Jaden Hackel. The first set went to Hackel 7-5, before Lindemoen bounced back to win the second set 6-4.  The third set was just as close and Perham won 6-4 to win the match, and more importantly, the Yellowjackets won the match overall, 4-3, to advance to the Section 8A Championship on Tuesday at Thief River Falls. After the match, Crookston head coach Cody Brekken had a long chat with his team, telling them how proud he was of their effort – both on Thursday and throughout the whole season.  “I’m super proud of how the girls played. Huge shoutout to our seniors. Catherine Tiedemann and Emma Borowicz on the varsity team will be big holes to fill, but I’m so proud of how the girls played today. It was a weird year leading up to the season, but very memorable. You can use this as a teaching tool, because you never take any of this for granted. We know what it takes to get there. We just need to execute and push forward, so this is a good learning tool for the younger players to say, ‘Let’s remember this, move on and get ready for what’s next.”

Crookston wraps up the season with an 11-2 record and will say goodbye to their two seniors, Catherine Tiedemann and Emma Borowicz.