For the first time in the history of Providence girls tennis, a player from the Celtics girls tennis team made it to a championship match in the East Suburban Catholic Conference Tournament. The event took place on Oct. 11-12 at Olivet Nazarene University on Friday and Marian Catholic on Saturday.
Entering the tournament, Maggie and Kelly Ruane were the second seeded doubles team behind Carmel, the only team they lost to in conference during the regular season. The Celtics duo received a bye the first round and then easily beat St. Viator 6-1, 6-0 in the second round and Benet 6-1, 6-6 (7-3) in the third round to earn the chance to play in the championship match.
The two teams entered the match at Marian fully knowing how close the previous match was at Carmel earlier in the year. In a highly skilled and hard fought battle, the two teams traded points in the first set, but Carmel pulled ahead and won 6-3. In the second set, the Ruane twins went up 3-1 and nearly 4-1, but Carmel got lucky and won the point to pull it to 3-2. But then the twins went up to 4-2 and one of the Carmel players began to panic and started crying. It didn't seem to throw her game off too much because she and her partner fought hard through several duece points to win the match 6-4 and the doubles championship. The Ruane twins received second-place medals, the highest finish for a Providence girls tennis player in the tournament's history.
Hannah Davis, the number one singles player for Providence, played very well and finished fifth. At second doubles, Mary Beth Galick and Lizzie Eggen made it to the third-place match, but lost to Fenwick to take fourth place.
