For 19 consecutive years, the Baldwinsville girls tennis team had to watch as Fayetteville-Manlius took sole ownership of the Section III Class A championship and built a 312-match win streak.
Finally, the Bees had a chance to do something about it when it met the Hornets in Wednesday’s Class A final at Mott Tennis Center in Utica, and while it got close, the Bees still fell short by a point, 4-3, as F-M made it 20 in a row.
The memory of their Sept. 7 classic, claimed by F-M 4-3 when Sienna Susko escaped two match points and rallied past Kahlei Reisinger in a third-set tie-breaker, was still fresh for both B’ville and F-M, adding to the tension.
Only there would not be a rematch between Reisinger and Susko, since the latter was put in doubles. Left to herself, Reisinger blew past Meaghan Creamer 6-0, 6-0, while Amari Pollard, half of the sectional Division I championship doubles team with Natalie Kot, went on her own and defeated Allison Donella 6-4, 6-2.
Where B’ville got hurt was in doubles. Three times, the Hornets won in straight sets, the Bees only earning a point when Lauren Dusse and Maddie Quilter took out Maggie Bonomo and Madison Jordan 6-2, 6-1.
Kot, paired this time with Taylor Ferrari, lost, 6-4, 6-0, to Susko and Alexandra Millimaci. Emma Funicello and Hannah Mautz went longer, but fell to Lyndsey Rand and Katie Roche 7-5, 6-2, with Madeline Fiello and Katherine Schumacher falling to Laurin Goldberg and Jessie Guarino 6-0, 6-1. Taylor Slink dropped her singles match to the Hornets’ Shirley Zhang.
To get that second shot at F-M, the Bees first had to navigate through last Monday’s Class A semifinal against Auburn, where a strong all-around effort produced a 5-2 victory over the Maroons.
Auburn stuck its singles superstar, Claire Minnoe, into doubles with Jessica Bolak, and together the pair beat Ferrari and Kot 6-0, 6-0.
But that just left the rest of the Maroons vulnerable, and B’ville pounced, starting with Reisinger routing Julia Wagner 6-1, 6-0, and continuing in singles with Pollard gaining a 6-4, 6-4 decision over Jenna Jarman.
A close doubles match went to a third-set tie-breaker before Fiello and Schumacher beat Lauryn Husby and Anupama Irri 6-4, 1-6, 7-6. By contrast, Funciello and Mautz routed Kaitlin Hlywa and Saran Wansor 6-2, 6-0, with Dusse and Quilter gaining a 6-2, 6-3 sweep over Natalie Herlihy and Anna Spin.
All of this led to the Section III state qualifier, where Kot and Pollard were back together as the top seed in doubles and Reisigner slid into the no. 3 seed in singles as play got underway Saturday at Syracuse University’s SkyTop Courts.
Each of them would go 2-0 in the early rounds. Kot and Pollard blanked Bridgette Sherlock and Phoebe Langdon (Westhill) 6-0, 6-0 in the first round, and in the quarterfinals turned back the Skaneateles sister tandem of Grace and Kathryn Magee 6-1, 6-3.
For her opening-round match, Reisinger faced Rome Free Academy’s Jordan General and claimed a 6-3, 6-2 victory. Then, in the quarterfinal round against Jamesville-DeWitt’s Rea Puka, Reisinger was even better winning a 6-0, 6-2.
So this led to the semifinals where Reisinger would, one more time, face Susko with a berth in the state tournament on the line. Kot and Pollard could advance if they beat F-M’s duo of Goldberg and Guarino in that same round.
