By Becky Walz,
Decorah had a solid showing at the 2022 state tennis tourney in Iowa City on Friday and Saturday. The Vikings sent a singles player, Allison Pavlovec, and a doubles team of Annalise Skrade and Mara Holland. All girls avoided being shut out in any of their matches.
Decorah had a solid showing at the 2022 state tennis tourney in Iowa City on Friday and Saturday. The Vikings sent a singles player, Allison Pavlovec, and a doubles team of Annalise Skrade and Mara Holland. All girls avoided being shut out in any of their matches.
Pavlovec made her first appearance at a state tournament and found herself matched up against Emily Blom, the number one player from Pella, and held her own. In each of the two sets played, the Viking was right there in each set but found herself getting blanked in the final three games of each set.
“No one can fault Allison’s determination as she made her opponent work for every point. Allison played her second match on the consolation side of the bracket against the number one girl from Lewis Central, Lanee Olsen. Allison again stayed close in the first four games of the first set but could not maintain that level as the match proceeded. The consolation side of the tournament plays no-add where a deuce point victor claims the game. Allison lost five deuce points, hence, five games. If the games would have gone the other way, Allison would have claimed the first set and who knows what might have happened,” said Coach Larry Berland.
Annalise and Mara went into the tournament seeded fourth in the Class 1A state tournament. They had finished in sixth place a year earlier and were determined to improve upon that outcome in this year’s tournament. Knowing they would have to play their best in order to make that happen, they started out strong against their first opponent on Friday. A solid duo from Davenport Assumption, Shannon Bush and Helen Sons, stood in their way of winning their first match of the day. The match see-sawed back and forth with each team holding a lead only to see the other team capture the lead from them. When Skrade and Holland won their fourth game in each set, Decorah shut down their opponent and finished very strong to take each set with an identical score of 6-4.
Moving into the quarterfinal round, the duo played a match against a tough Clarinda team, Taylor Cole and Mayson Hartley. The very same scenario that had worked in the first set again came about and Decorah found themselves winning the second set, 6-4, 6-4. The victory qualified the Vikes for the final four.
Decorah really was up against it in the final four as they had to play the number one seeded team from Cedar Rapids Xavier, Ally Burger and Courtney Carstensen, and last year’s doubles champions in their first match on Saturday. Skrade and Holland played some of their best tennis of their career and still found themselves behind the defending champs. The Xavier girls really brought the heat and were not afraid to venture out in the court to poach shots. Playing through many deuce games, the first set and second set ended in identical scores of 2-6, 2-6.
The next step was to play for a third-place finish in the tourney. Decorah found themselves having to play the No. 2 seeded team from Waterloo Columbus, Chloe Butler and Avery Hogan.
“Again, the score in the first and second set wavered back and forth in the early going. Neither team was able to gain a solid lead as the score changed frequently in each set. Columbus began to showcase a stronger shot along with winning several of the dreaded no-add points to determine a set winner. Decorah doubles finished in fourth place, right where they had been seeded. Allison, unfortunately, did not place in the singles tournament but played as good of tennis as she had played all year in her two matches at the state tournament. A big thanks has to go out to Coaches Laursen, Shilling and Yee for all of their help this year and at the state tourney. Without them, Decorah tennis would not have been represented at the state tennis tourney,” concluded Coach Berland.
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