MANCHESTER, NH – Navigating through the choppy waters of Division I girls tennis, the Central High School girls tennis team has emerged as a sound vessel capable of staying afloat deep into the postseason.
With an 8-1 home victory over 7-3 Goffstown High School on Thursday, the Little Green improved to 9-2 on the season, their only setbacks coming to undefeated Bedford, a team that appears on track to win its third-straight Division I championship and fifth in six years.
With that said, Goffstown coach Bruce Hale said the Little Green have positioned themselves as one of the top contenders to dethrone the Bulldogs this season.
“Central is a really strong team,” he said. “They’re definitely up there (in Division I), along with a few others.”
First-year Central head coach Karen Leclerc said it’s all going to come down to the random regional playoff draw.
“With the right draw, we can go pretty far,” she said, “but if we draw Bedford, we’re probably out. If it weren’t for Bedford, we’d probably be 16-0.”
Still, those the two regular season setbacks to Bedford – 8-1 on April 26 and 6-1 two days later – were closer than they appear on paper.
“We played them well. You know, we won one court, which was big, and then we lost 8-6 on three courts, but they’re tough,” said Leclerc. “On the right day, with all the stars aligned, maybe we can do it. Maybe.”
Senior captain Erin Flurey, a soccer standout at Central, leads the Little Green on the tennis court as well. She won her singles match over Goffstown’s Arielle Korn, 8-1, on Thursday before getting a rest in doubles action with the team triumph locked up.
Freshman Emily Leclerc, playing second on the Central ladder, shutout Jamie Baines, 8-0, before teaming up with junior Megan Haddad, the team’s No. 3 player, to defeat Korn and Baines, 8-2. Haddad earned an 8-1 singles win over Kenna Piecuch.
Christina Gatzoulis, Jolie Mailloux and Natalie Friedland won 9-7, 8-6 and 8-1, respectively, in the other three singles matches.
In doubles play, Emily Leclerc teamed with Haddad to win 8-2 on the first court, Mailloux and Emily Hobausz took an 8-1 victory on the second court and Tess Beckman and Lauren Bouthot fell in a tightly contested 8-4 match on court three.
Despite a relative lack of overall varsity experience, Central has seen similar team and personal success up and down the ladder all season. From the team’s three seniors, including Flurey and co-captain Gatzoulis, as well as Mailloux, down to Emily Leclerc and fellow underclassmen such as Beckman, Bouthot and Nevaeh Martineau, the Little Green are winning and having fun doing it.
“I’m just super lucky to have this team in my first year,” said the elder Leclerc. “I’d like to say it’s coaching, but a lot of it is just athleticism, plus three of these girls are seniors and they grew up playing at Sudden Pitch (in Manchester’s North End), so they’ve played a little bit, and if you’re an athlete, and you have some coordination, you can teach someone quickly, so I’m just lucky to inherit these three seniors who have played two years before this, and then I have three kids always vying for No. 6, which is a great problem to have, so it’s been fun.”
The Little Green now look to continue their success with a cross-city clash against Trinity set for 4 this afternoon before closing the regular season with back-to-back matchups with Concord, first at home this Monday and then on the road Wednesday.
