North girls earn runner-up spot in district tennis
Coaching and talent at North Fort Myers High School has a way of making female athletes perform at a high level.
The girls’ tennis team became another example of girl power at the school as it earned district runner-up honors at the District 3A-11 tournament last week at Charlotte.
While nobody could provide a challenge to Fort Myers, which ran the table in the girls’ draw and won comfortably in the boys’ division, North put three girls in the finals as well as both doubles teams.
Girls’ coach Linda Caracciolo said it was a tremendous tournament for her team.
“We had consistency and we played good matches against Fort Myers in singles. In doubles we had convincing wins in the semifinals, but rain stopped the finals,” Caracciolo said.
Most impressive was North’s ability to find solid players in the lower seeds. Freshman Erin Post has played well in the No. 1 position, with senior Megan Sushil at No. 2, both of whom have played well all season. It was the bottom three who proved their worth by scoring wins all season long against more top-heavy teams.
Bailey Harris was 15-0 in the No. 3 position after playing No. 2 last year. Coral Jarvis was 14-1 in the No. 4 hole, as was freshman Paola Henderson in the No. 5 slot.
“The No. 1 is playing everyone’s strongest player, but we know we’re strong all the way down. It makes things easier because we can compete at all levels,” Caracciolo said.
Sushil, though disappointed at not making it out of the first round, said she was pleased overall.
“We’ve come a long way this season. We worked really hard and it all paid off today. We had a strong No. 1 and everyone stepped up behind her,” Sushil said. “Our goal was to make it this far and we did a little better than most expected.”
Harris said she felt more comfortable at No. 3 this year on a team that plays evenly down the line.
“With the freshman moving to No. 1 it dropped us down a spot, but we grew much stronger while the competition didn’t,” Harris said. “We’ve gotten stronger with each match we’ve played, so I’m looking forward to regionals.”
This week, the girls won’t have the benefit of much coaching due to spring break, but will be back in action at regionals on the road against a yet-to-be-determined opponent on April 7.
“We’re going to push each other to keep playing during the break and hopefully that will carry us into regionals,” Sushil said.