The Palo Alto High School girls’ tennis team (6-4, 0-2) looks to improve upon its league record after winning the Paly Invitational Tennis Tournament on Saturday.
The team placed first out of five participating schools, which included Aragon, Castilleja, Notre Dame and Stevenson high schools, according to coach Andy Harader.
Senior co-captain Halle Biorn is optimistic about the team’s future performance, but adds that winning games in league will still be a challenge.
“I’m hoping this win will give us more confidence when we go into our next couple games,” Biorn said. “They’re all going to be close games because our opponents are very good.”
Senior co-captain Kelsey Wang echoed Biorn, with hopes to get a spot in the Central Coast Section playoffs.
“We’re all very excited about this tournament win, especially because Stevenson and Castilleja are strong teams, but we outperformed them,” Wang said. “We’ve played some tough teams so far in the [De Anza] league, so hopefully the win will give us the momentum we need to win more matches in our league. If we continue to work hard and play strategically, I think we have a good shot at making it to CCS.”
Despite high hopes, Harader stresses the difficult competition in the De Anza League, which the team moved up to this year.
“Our league is the best in NorCal [Northern California] and Central California, loaded with highly ranked players, so [the league is] extremely difficult,” Harader said. “We have several ranked players but just not as high.”
Wang sees room for improvement as the team adjusts to the intense competitiveness of the league.
“I think we can still improve in regards to our aggressiveness in match play,” Wang said. “Since we moved up from a lower league last year, many of us are still determining how to approach opponents who aren’t afraid to attack quickly, but I definitely think we will improve as the team gains more experience”
The Viking’s next match is against Homestead High School (3-0, 1-0) at 3:30 p.m. today at home.
“I know that our team is hungry for a league win, so we have a good shot at beating Homestead,” Wang said.