Weber and Heyen each take 2nd in singles at Ellsworth

By OLIVER GOOD

Staff writer

Hillsboro’s tennis team placed seventh out of 11 teams competing at Lyons Saturday in the Central Kansas League tournament.

After beating Jade Hoover, an opponent from Pratt, Hillsboro senior Allison Weber faced Bessa Bwalya of Hosington, who is one of the top players in the state, according to coach Bob Woelk.

“Allison played hard and gave the power player a battle,” Woelk said. “But Bwalya was the eventual league champion.”

Weber stayed with Bwalya 5-5 in the first set, but eventually lost that set 7-5 and the second set 6-1.

Weber went on to play a strong first set against Morgan Holopirek, of Hesston, but ultimately ran out of gas losing both matches, 6-4 and 6-2, to place fourth in No. 1 singles where she was originally seeded for the tournament.

In No. 2 singles, senior Claire Heyen dropped all of her matches. After a bye in the first round, and a loss to a Hoisington player, she lost to a Lyons opponent in a tough 9-7 match.

“It was a tough day for Claire,” Woelk said. “She was not overpowered by any of them. She just couldn’t string together any consistent shots at key times in matches.”

In No. 1 doubles, Allison Gray and Hannah Funk lost all their matches to place 10th overall, including a tiebreaker in their final game against the same Lyons pair they lost to in their first match of the day.

“This was only the second time these two played together this year,” Woelk said. “They showed considerable progress as evidence by their improvement from first match to last.”

In No. 2 doubles, a new pairing of Madison Klein and Darcy Heinrichs resulted in a positive debut.

After losing their first two matches, they came back to win against teams from Kingman and Nickerson to place 9th overall.

Woelk said Klein and Heinrichs were close in all their matches and seemed to make better shots as the day progressed.

Ellsworth

Weber and Heyen each took second place and medaled in their respective singles brackets Monday at a round robin tennis tournament in Ellsworth.

Weber finished with a 3-1 record and Heyen finished at 2-2 wining a tiebreaker to take second.

In doubles competition, the teams of Klein and Heinrichs and Gray and Funk each placed fifth with tournament records of 1-3 and 0-4.