Ottawa strike leaves tennis sectional wide open

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The door has been opened and tennis players from nine schools are ready to step in.
The ongoing teachers’ strike at Ottawa High School, now in its third week, has forced a change of venue for this weekend’s IHSA girls’ sectional tennis tournament. Ottawa has played sectional host since 1997, but this year’s tournament will now be played at Rochelle, which built a new school with 10 tennis courts.
If the strike continues, Ottawa’s girls will not be able to participate at sectional, which leaves the door wide open for players from other schools like Princeton and St. Bede to seize state qualifying berths. Ottawa has won three straight sectional titles and has a total of 22 in school history and has continued to produced state qualifiers over the years.
“There’s always the same teams that send someone to state. With Ottawa dropping out, it just opens the door wide open. Every team that’s there has a chance,” Princeton coach Connie Lind said. “Ottawa’s been dominating. They’ve been the main force for many years. I just feel sorry for the players. It’s not their fault.”
Princeton is coming off a fourth-place finish in the NCIC Meet over the weekend. Lind is very high on her team’s chances of landing high seeds and getting some singles and doubles teams out to state.
Senior Evinne Dimmig has a good chance in becoming the first PHS player to qualify for state two years in a row since Lind has been coaching girls’ tennis at PHS. She is coming off a second-place finish at conference and is playing the best “I’ve seen her play all year,” Lind said.
The top doubles teams is made up of seniors Emiley Brand and Tristan Hicks, who have beaten Ottawa and are “playing pretty tough together,” Lind said. They placed eighth at NCIC.
The team of Lindsey Frank and Courtney Schafer took first at No. 2 doubles at conference, rallying to defeat Geneseo 5-7, 6-2, 6-3.
Alex Beetz is filling in at the other singles for Michaela Nelson, who is out for the season with a tore ACL.
The Tigresses placed fourth at conference in a tightly-packed field including Sterling (34), Dixon (33), Geneseo (32) and PHS (31) that saw the top four teams separated by only three points. Ottawa, the defending champ, was ineligible to play.
Friday’s sectional competition will start at 1 p.m. and they are hoping to get through three rounds, which would set up Saturday’s semifinals. Those semifinalists would already have punched their ticket to state.
There is just one class for IHSA tennis, which is broken down into 32 sectionals.
NCIC cross country: Princeton and Hall runners will compete for NCIC honors in Saturday’s conference meet in Sterling.
The dual meet with the Reagan Division will start at 10 a.m.

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