Girls Tennis Wins Decisively Over Belmont

Girls Tennis Coach Tim Stonecipher said his team played with passion last night after beating Belmont 4 to 1 in the MIAA Division 2 North Quarterfinals at MHS.

"Talk about playing your best tennis when it counts," Stonecipher said.  "We had pretty special performances from everyone." 

The Magicians got wins from the doubles pairs of sophomores Lindsey Cohen/Megan Stanojev (7-5, 7-5) and freshman Meghan Gabel paired with senior-captain Morgan Sharrio (6-3, 6-3).

Also winning for Marblehead were Freshman Annie Ryan (6-3, 6-3) in third singles and Junior Julia Burke (1-6, 6-1, 6-3) in a very competitive first singles contest.

"[Julia] has fought hard all year," said Stonecipher about her come from behind victory. "She has had numerous three-set matches and she hadn't gotten over that hump [to win] and what better of a time than the quarterfinals of a state tournament to get over that hump."

Stonecipher added, "Julia plays the best player every match and that's something that the other girls just don't know what it's like, and she had sort of struggled to win those big points in big matches, so today was just awesome."

"It was a strong match all-round," said Burke of her contest against Belmont's Choah Kim. "In every match, she hit key shots and I really just had to capitalize and show that I wanted it more. We both had really good skill and it just came down to who got the points in the end."

The fifth-seed Marblehead Magicians move on to face top-seeded Winchester, who is undefeated at 18-0, on Thursday in the semifinal round.

The other semifinal match features two familiar teams -- 11^th-seeded Gloucester will take on the reigning NEC Champs, and second-seeded Swampscott.

"[Winchester] are seeded number one, but if you look at the brackets the seeds are all over the place," said Burke. "Some of the low seeds are beating the high teams and vice-versa, so we just have to go into it trying our hardest."

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