Platte County expects the learning curve but found plenty of positives in Friday’s home tournament. The Pirates were sixth out of eight teams with three medalists while three players received their first big tests.
Platte County sophomore Jayne Muir hits a shot during a No. 5 singles match in the Platte County Invitational on Friday at Platte County High School.
Each team entered six singles and three doubles flights in brackets of shorter, one-set matches.
“The girls competed well overall,” Platte County first-year coach Scott Blakley said. “For a lot of them, it was their first big varsity tournament. Getting to play singles and doubles is a lot, and I think all of the girls for every school were very exhausted by the end of it.
“That’s something to build on.”
Half of Platte County’s singles players advanced to the championship side of the brackets with junior Ellie Kaser (No. 1), sophomore Jayne Muir (No. 5) and junior Macy Doll (No. 6) all finishing in the top three. Additionally, the team of Kaser and sophomore Macie Keith finished fourth at No. 1 doubles.
From outside the lineup as a freshman to No. 2 last season, Kaser earned the No. 2 seed in her bracket and reached the finals with comfortable victories of 6-2 and 6-1. She earned a rematch with Liberty North junior Olivia Escobar, a returning Class 3 state singles qualifier who won the flight title with a 6-1 victory.
Platte County junior Macy Doll hits a shot during a No. 6 singles match in the Platte County Invitational on Friday at Platte County High School.
The two played earlier in the week in Platte County’s season-opening dual with Kaser making her debut at No. 1 after being a Class 2 state doubles qualifier.
Muir added another runnerup showing at No. 5 for Platte County while playing in extremely tight matches. After a 6-1 victory in the first round, she led 5-2 in her semifinal matchup before holding on late for a 6-5 victory.
In the final, Muir again led 5-2 against Liberty North sophomore Lauren Noland but dropped the final four game to finish second. The two played just three days earlier in the teams’ dual with Noland winning that matchup 8-2.
“Jayne Muir played pretty well,” Blakley said. “Jayne’s doing a really good job of keeping the ball in and just fighting for every point.”
Kaser and sophomore Macie Keith, moving up to No. 2 in this year’s lineup after a strong freshman season, continued to play No. 1 doubles for Platte County and reached the championship side of the bracket with a 6-2 win in the first round against Warrensburg but went 1-2 to finish fourth and just outside of the medals. The Pirates must rebuild all three doubles teams this year, and juniors Addison Fleming and Lillian Goodale (seventh) played No. 2, while Doll and freshman Clare Hayter (fifth) were at No. 3.
Platte County junior Lillian Goodale hits a serve during a No. 4 singles match in Friday’s Platte County Invitational at Platte County High School.
Doll and Hayter closed with back-to-back victories, including a 6-5 triumph in the fifth-place match.
Platte County missed out on more points due to first-round losses in singles for Keith (eighth, No. 2), Fleming (sixth, No. 3) and Goodale (sixth, No. 4). In particular, Goodale lost match point in her opener against Warrensburg when the ball struck the top of the net and just eked over and stayed inbounds.
Warrensburg went on to win the flight, while Goodale went 1-1 in her consolation matches.
“I think we will improve a lot in the weeks to come,” Blakley said. “If we played those teams again, I think we could turn a few of (those matches) into wins. There were a few that were really close that we could’ve won.”
Liberty North 9, Platte County 0
The Eagles earned a nonconference sweep Tuesday in Liberty with Blakley making his head coaching debut after replacing program founder Zach Keith.
Platte County junior Addison Fleming hits a backhand during a No. 3 singles match in Friday’s Platte County Invitational at Platte County High School.
Platte County nearly took the No. 1 doubles match with Kaser and Keith twice serving for the match at both 7-6 and 8-7. Liberty North’s team Escobar and junior Olivia Pierson came back to win 9-8 (8-2) in the tiebreaker, and the Eagles led 3-0 going into singles.
“We had a good overall mood and were ready overall, and they really just punched us in the mouth,” Blakley said.
Doll lost 8-6 at No. 6 in the closest of the final six matches, while Kaser took three games from Escobar in what ended up a preview of Friday’s Platte County Invitational No. 1 singles bracket.
Liberty North entered off of playing in the Joplin Interstate Championships and have already built a 7-1 record on the season. Platte County graduated four of the eight players who were in the lineup for last season’s run to the Class 2 District 8 championship match, a loss that prevented the Pirates from a second straight playoff berth.
Platte County plays two more duals this week before traveling to the Warrensburg Invitational on Friday.
“(Liberty North was) definitely more experienced and had played a little more tennis than us, even this season,” Blakley said. “It was tough, but we know we have work to do and we’re excited to continue to practice and get better.”
