Published: May 23, 2009 10:04 pm      

NorthWood nips Jimtown to win crown at Goshen

There wasn’t much suspense as to which team was going to win the girls tennis sectional championship Saturday afternoon at Goshen Middle School.

The NorthWood Panthers won the first three matches in rather easy fashion for a 3-2 win over the Jimtown Jimmies.

In Saturday morning’s semifinals, Jimtown topped the Goshen Redskins 4-1 while NorthWood edged Fairfield 3-2.

NorthWood meets Northridge on Tuesday at 5 in the Northridge regional. The East Noble winner and Warsaw also meet at 5.

Tuesday’s winners return for the regional championship Wednesday at 5 p.m.

NorthWood and Jimtown just played their regular season match Tuesday with NorthWood winning by the same score and both winning points at the same positions.

“We had to finish the Northern Lakes Conference tournament Monday. We were energy drained so I was glad we didn’t have to play Thursday (opening round of the sectional),” NorthWood coach Tif Schwartz said.

“That allowed us to focus solely on Fairfield in the semifinals.”

It’s the second sectional championship in NorthWood girls history. The first was in 2007.

“We had a great season, finishing with an 11-2 record with both losses being to NorthWood,” Jimtown coach Tim Courliss said.

NorthWood took both doubles matches in rather convincing fashion.

Seniors Alli Heeter and Kerry Hoffer defeated seniors Brianna Houghton and Ashlee Springsteen 6-2, 6-2 at No. 1 while seniors Jill Focht and Lindsey Mast downed senior Cristen Burke and sophomore Korie Kelver 6-0, 6-2 at No. 2.

Heeter and Hoffer have a 17-1 record.

“We have a lot of three-sport athletes, but the girls have worked hard on their games since last season,” Schwartz said.

“We shuffled our lineup. Hoffer played singles last season and she came to me about playing some doubles. (Junior) Melissa Ramer had played doubles and she approached me about moving over to singles.

“I wasn’t sure how the changes were going to work, but right now I’m glad we made them.”

Despite the outcome of the match no longer being in doubt, Jimtown’s remaining singles players kept on battling.

Senior Brittney Stebbins defeated Ramer 6-1, 6-0 at No. 1 and junior Sarah DeShone downed Courtney Simpson 6-4, 6-4 at No. 2.

Stebbins improved her record to 17-1 and DeShone finishes 18-0.

Jimtown won its first-ever tennis sectional title a year ago.

“We lost a couple good singles players to graduation,” Courliss said. “Stebbins and DeShone have given us great leadership this season.”