“Tennis isn’t really a team sport, but we made it one.”
Senior co-captain Asha Sata defined what every player on the girls’ tennis team strove for: being one cohesive group in a largely individual sport.
“Even though we were in different grades, we were all one,” senior Christina Ahn said. “We were never really friends with someone but not friends with someone else. We never had separate groups on the team.”
The team’s camaraderie and willingness to help each other showed in their record as they ended the season 21-1 (their only loss came in the state championship), despite moving up from 3A to 4A in the 2020 NCHSAA reclassification (every four years the NCHSAA reclassifies high school based on their sports-eligible student population into four different groups).
“We didn’t expect to do that well,” Sata said, reflecting on the team’s undefeated regular season.
For coach Nick Walker, the record is a reflection of his team’s chemistry and work ethic, especially throughout the pandemic.
“All of our kids kept coming out despite COVID—some teams didn’t,” Walker said. “We just had a good nucleus of girls coming back in the spring [last year], and then a couple of new players joined us… and it just sort of clicked.”
The team’s persistence led to a dominant season in which the scores of just two of their first 20 wins were within three matches or fewer—they won 6-3 against Cape Fear and Cary Academy. So, although they rode a 20-game win streak into the regional championship, they hadn’t had experience in tough, close games.
The regional final against Leesville Road, which carried its own 16-game win streak into the game, was not only going to be the toughest test the team faced all season, it was going to decide whether or not East would get a chance to play in the 4A state championship for the first time in over a decade.
After taking an early lead, the team experienced their first mental test of the season.
“We won [four out of six] singles matches, so we were up [4-2] against them,” Ahn said. “But then our doubles started losing. All [three] of them were losing, but then our number two doubles started coming back. They were the ones who brought us the chance to go to the state championship.”
The Wildcats, after winning one of three doubles matches, won the regional championship by a score of 5-4. The win was emotional for every player on the team, including the other senior co-captain, Maddie Moore.
“Everybody rushed the court and we were hugging,” Moore said. “One of our teammates was, like, bawling her eyes out. It was really fun.”
Ultimately, the season ended with a 5-0 loss to Marvin Ridge in the state championship Nov. 6, but Walker is proud of how the group performed throughout the season and remained steadfast in its effort to play as a team.
“I give these girls a lot of credit—we had a shortened season last spring, but they came out to practice in the mornings and they showed a lot of passion,” Walker said. “But what really makes it special is that our girls work hard to make it a team sport.”
Photo by Caroline Chen/The ECHO
