Sacred Heart-Griffin won the Class 1A Jacksonville Sectional and Chatham Glenwood advanced its top two singles players to the Class 2A Illinois High School Association girls state tennis finals.
In all, seven players from the Springfield area qualified for state. Here is how they fared in both sectional classes.
Samantha Shankland, Ellie Surges bound for state
The top four placers in both singles and doubles advance to the state tournament and Shankland, a Glenwood senior, spent more than three hours on the Velasco tennis court in a quarterfinal match on Friday while stamping her ticket to the Class 2A finals at the Glenwood Sectional in Washington Park.
Shankland, seeded fifth, defeated fourth-seeded Gabi Hill of Edwardsville 3-6, 6-4, 7-6 (3) in the quarterfinal. The roller-coaster match ended with drama when Shankland went up 5-1 in the third and final set, only to lose the next five games to Hill and trail 6-5.
Shankland evened the third set at six apiece before winning the tiebreak 7-3. Shankland got a little revenge from Hill after she lost to her 6-2, 6-3 at the Belleville West Sectional in last season’s quarterfinals and missed going to state.
Friday’s win catapulted Shankland into the semifinals and she took out second seed Natalie Spihlman of O’Fallon 7-5, 6-0 on Saturday. Edwardsville’s Dia Kannan, the No. 1 seed, downed Shankland 6-1, 7-5 in the title match.
More: Glenwood junior Surges onto CS8 tennis scene
Surges, a sixth-seeded junior, also needed a three-set win in the quarterfinals. She lost the first set to No. 3 seed Toby Hawkes of Collinsville but rallied for a 6-7 (1), 6-0, 6-3 victory.
Kannan defeated Surges 6-0, 6-0 in the semis, but Surges rebounded and won the third-place match 6-3, 5-7 after Spilhman retired before the third set due to a rolled ankle.
Edwardsville won the sectional title with 32 points and Glenwood was second with 21. Belleville West had two doubles teams in the third-place match and finished third with 19. Notably, Springfield High ended up tied for seventh with Alton and Granite City with four points each.
More: Teammates battle: Shankland beats Surges in all-Glenwood CS8 tennis meet
Caroline Sheehan, doubles team pace SHG
Sheehan, the No. 1 singles seed, rolled to the title and advanced to her first Class 1A state tennis finals.
Sheehan defeated Bunker Hill’s Samantha Anderson 6-0, 6-1 in Friday’s quarterfinals and beat fifth seed Neely Goetten of Jerseyville 6-2, 6-1 in Saturday’s semis. She won the singles title with a 6-2, 6-0 victory over No. 2 seed Kiley King of Jerseyville in the championship match.
Sheehan did not play in the postseason during her junior year because of some missed tournaments during the regular season. She has been with the team the whole way in her senior season.
As the fifth seed, Lucia Hassebrock and Catalina Mosquera of SHG reached their first 1A state finals with a fourth-place finish.
Hassebrock and Mosquera beat fourth seed Leah Range and Abby White of Jacksonville 6-4, 1-6, 6-1 in the quarterfinals before losing to top seed Emma Davis and Abigail Harms of Bethalto Civic Memorial 6-3, 6-2 in the semis. The SHG team then lost to third seed Morgan Zanger and Kaitlyn Brown 6-2, 6-1 in the third-place match.
Rochester doubles advance, take second
Senior Julia Musgrave, The State Journal-Register’s All-area Player of the Year last season, paired with teammate Cora Haupt and the duo finished runner-up in the 1A doubles draw at Jacksonville.
Musgrave and Haupt knocked out unseeded Finley York and Norah Alexander of Jacksonville 6-2, 6-3 in the quarters, and then defeated third seed Morgan Zanger and Kaitlyn Brown of Quincy Notre Dame 6-4, 6-4 in the semis.
Davis and Harms posted a 6-2, 6-1 win over the second-seeded Rochester tandem in the title match. It will be Musgrave’s fourth trip to state. She went in doubles her freshman year and qualified in singles during her sophomore and junior seasons.
Near-misses and notables
At the Glenwood Sectional, the unseeded doubles team of Myla Shannon and Madisyn Williams from Springfield High, came up short in the doubles quarterfinals, falling to sixth-seeded Morgan Seagle and Gabrielle Patterson of Belleville West 6-1, 6-2.
Unseeded Lydia Ryherd and Stella Lopp of Glenwood also dropped their quarterfinal match, succumbing to Sophie Byron and Katie Woods of Edwardsville 6-0, 6-0 in the quarters. Bryon and Woods, the overwhelming No. 1 seed, won the doubles title by beating their third-seeded teammates Veda Kommineni and Bina Selimi 6-0, 6-1 in the championship match.
At Jacksonville, SHG could not send a second singles player to state when sixth seed Laney Aleman lost her quarterfinal match to third seed Alyssa Ley of Quincy Notre Dame 7-5, 6-2.
Rochester’s Grace Winkler won her first-round match in straight sets and was beaten by fifth seed Neely Goetten of Jerseyville 6-2, 6-0 in Round 2. Jacksonville’s Olivia Dobson also fell in the second round, losing to No. 4 seed Maddie Waters of Alton Marquette 6-0, 6-2.
Contact Trevor Lawrence: 788-1548, trevor.lawrence@sj-r.com.
This article originally appeared on State Journal-Register: IHSA girls tennis: Springfield standouts qualify for state meet
