Sports
Crusader girls ace FAA tennis crown

May 9, 2008

The 2008 St. Luke’s girls’ tennis team made history this spring.

The Lady Crusaders captured their first-ever Fairchester Athletic Association championship by going a perfect 7-0 in the league and finishing 9-0 overall following Monday’s 5-0 season-ending win over KLHT.

“I was expecting to win today,” veteran head coach Brinley Ehlers said after the match. “But our big win this season was against Greenwich Academy. They’ve won the league championship for so many years in a row.”

Six in a row, to be exact, but St. Luke’s scored an impressive 4-1 win over the Gators back on April 22 that helped pave the way for a new FAA champ.

“Last year that was the only loss we had in the league. We lose to them every year,” Ehlers, who just completed her 11th season, pointed out. “Last year we lost to them 4-1, but there were a couple of matches that didn’t go our way. This year everything seemed to go our way.

“It was the first time in years I felt we had the ability to beat them and the girls were so excited and fired up to play them. So that was really the turning point. I knew if could beat Greenwich Academy, we could beat Sacred Heart and Greens Farms, who also had tough teams.”

In fact, after they beat GA, the Crusaders’ next two matches were against Convent of the Sacred Heart and GFA, and they beat both of them 4-1 as well.

“Sacred Heart and us both had 4-0 records going into our match, so that was a big win. They have a very good team,” Ehlers, a math teacher at the school, said. “Not only were our girls playing with confidence, but everything was going our way.”

St. Luke’s also posted a 4-3 non-league win over a very good Hopkins team, their only real close match of the season.

“That was a nice win for us,” Ehlers agreed. “They’re a much bigger school than us.”

There have been several reasons for the Crusaders’ success this season, but three of the bigger ones are the Douglass sisters — Megan, Alison and Lauren.

Megan Douglass, a junior, finished the season a perfect 9-0 at No. 1 singles.

“She played first singles for me last year and went undefeated as a sophomore,” Ehlers said. “She was the best player in the league again this year.”

Meanwhile, freshman Katherine Pettee of New Canaan also went undefeated for the Crusaders at No. 2 singles, giving St. Luke’s as potent a one-two punch as there was in the FAA.

And if that wasn’t enough, senior co-captain Eliza Kontulis of New Canaan and freshman Alison Douglass were unbeaten at No. 1 doubles.

“So between those three matches, one and two singles and one doubles, I always could rely on them winning,” Ehlers said. “We won most of our matches 4-1 or 5-0.”

Indeed, of their nine matches this season, St. Luke’s won five of them 5-0 and another three 4-1. The lone exception was the 4-3 win over Hopkins.

“Pretty much everybody stepped up the whole season, especially when we played Greenwich Academy.”

That would include freshman Lauren Douglas, Alison’s twin, who played third singles.

“She went undefeated in the FAA and her only loss all season was against Hopkins,” Ehlers noted. “She was consistent at three singles.

Morgan O’Neil, the other senior co-captain who’s also from New Canaan, teamed up with sophomore Maggie Seaver, another New Canaan resident, at No. 2 doubles.

The only other senior on the roster, Meaghan Keane, was sidelined with a shoulder injury, “but she’s been around rooting for all her teammates at every match,” Ehlers pointed out. “She’s been with us for four years.”

Freshmen Lilly Robinson and New Canaan’s Sarah Steppacher are also players who saw some action this season in exhibitions.

“They played in three or four matches, and a couple of times Lilly slipped into second doubles when someone was out,” Ehlers said.

And the best thing about this year’s St. Luke’s team is it’s really young. With a junior at No. 1 singles, a freshman at two and three singles, another freshman at one doubles and a sophomore at two doubles, the future certainly looks bright for the Crusaders, who resembled a seasoned, veteran group on the court.

This season still isn’t quite over yet for St. Luke’s. The FAA individual championships, featuring the top two singles players from each team, will take place a week from Monday at Convent of the Sacred Heart in Greenwich. The next day, the No. 1 doubles teams from every school in the league will go at it

“I believe Megan Douglass will be the top seed in the singles tournament, and our No. 1 doubles team should also be seeded first,” Ehlers said. “We’ve already had a real good season, and if we could win both the singles and doubles titles, that would be sweet.”

It would certainly be the icing on the cake to an historic season at St. Luke’s, where girls tennis is suddenly the talk on campus.

“There’s a huge buzz at St. Luke’s,” Ehlers said. “There was a lot of energy around the courts all season. A lot of people watched us and there was a lot of talk all around school.

“It was just one of those magical seasons.”

© Copyright 2008 by Hersam Acorn Newspapers