Girls Varsity Tennis Comes Up Clutch in the First Round

November 7, 2024

The Rams defeat CIF D2 #10-seed Arcadia High School 10-8 in a close first round playoff match.

Cate’s top singles player, Ivy Huang ’28, vaulted Cate to an early lead with a 6-1 win against Arcadia senior Anastasia Jorniak (UTR 5.5). Fellow ninth grader Jade Wang followed suit with a 6-0 win over a UTR 4.2 player, while Reyna Takahashi ’27 re-entered the singles lineup for a 6-1 victory at #3.

Cate’s singles lineup was dominant through the day, winning 7-of-9 sets, and setting the table for a Cate victory.

Arcadia fielded a stronger, more experienced doubles lineup, taking 5-0 leads at lines 1 and 2 before eventually closing those sets out 6-3 and 6-1, respectively.  Elsie Chamberlain ’26 and fChelsea Newlove ’28 briefly led at #3 doubles but were unable to put Cate doubles on the board in the first round, eventually falling 4-6.

In round two, Cate mounted a comeback, taking strong leads at #1 and #2 doubles, with senior/sophomore combo Colette Chang ’25/Lisa Hasebe ’27 taking a 6-1 win and freshman/sophomore combo Elly Edwards ’28/Claire Tang  ’27defeated the Arcadia #3 team 6-2.

Chang and Hasebe took a 6-1 set-win in the third round, which clinched the match for Cate with a 9th set-win. That was followed shortly after by a singles win from Takahashi to reach 10 and confirm the clear win without counting games.

Coach Thorpe’s Comments:

We have a young team, so facing a strong Arcadia squad away, fighting through traffic and arriving with little time to warm up, the message was clear: this is going to be a battle.

We had to fight for every point like it’s the only point; hat’s what we agreed to in the huddle before taking the courts, and that’s the performance I got from the team today.

I’m so proud of this largely underclassmen team, which continues to perform well in high-pressure situations. Ivy was dominant today and showed why she’s our #1 singles player with that big win in the first round, but everyone chipped in. Though the first round was a 3-3 tie, we started to accumulate a significant lead in games right away, which took some of the pressure off in case of a 9-9 tie.

What’s Next for Cate Girls’ Tennis?

The Rams return to Cate Mesa to host Xavier Prep of Palm Desert on Friday, November 8th in the 2nd Round of CIF D2 Playoffs.