Well-earned wins and losses to be learned from both took place at the TVL Tennis Tournament on Friday and Saturday April 19th-20th. Playing in Riverbank, Ripon High Varsity tennis fought hard and landed 3rd place overall. Making the top three wasn’t the only achievement made as senior Sahaj Gill won 1st place overall for the tournament’s boys singles. When asked how he played, Sahaj responded by saying that he “definitely could have played better,” but that his opponents “all sucked.”
“I think it’s really cool that Sahaj won,” says junior Ella Parsons, “And I’m super proud of him for that.” Ella has been playing tennis since freshman year and currently plays #2 girls doubles with her partner junior Mia Blancarte. The duo faced a hard loss to the Riverbank doubles team, yet that doesn’t mean that they gained nothing from the experience.
“We were already down and we didn’t have anything to lose at that point, so we decided to switch things around.” Ella, who usually plays at the net, decided to switch to playing the back. While Ella and Mia still unfortunately lost their match, this change in strategy made a significant difference in the way that they played.
“I played a lot better in the 2nd set because my partner and I tried a different strategy,” says Ella. After this tournament, the two will definitely continue to try new strategies and improve overall in the way that they play.
Besides Sahaj’s overall victory, one of the most impressive performances came from senior Levi Lundrigan, who also played boys doubles. Levi started his matches strong, beating his first opponent and continuing to play hard in his second match until an accident happened.
“I think I played really well and I was on track to win, until I was injured.” Near the end of his match against Hughson, Levi tore a muscle in his leg, making it extremely difficult to keep playing. At that point in his match, Levi was beating his opponent, but he knew that he’d be forced to forfeit if he stopped playing. Because of this, Levi powered through the rest of his match, beating his opponent and earning a hard-fought win. While Levi was sadly unable to play the rest of the tournament, he will fortunately be healed by the time that playoffs begin.
Playoffs, which is the next step on Varsity Tennis Team’s journey, begin on Thursday May 2nd. The team will be playing at home vs Lindhurst from Sacramento, so make sure to stop by and cheer the team on!
