Wyomissing falls a step shy in PIAA bid with 3-2 loss to Sewickley Academy
HERSHEY >> Wyomissing’s bid for a second PIAA team tennis title in three seasons fell one court short Saturday evening at Hershey Racquet Club.
The Spartans, the 2016 state champs, lost the Class AA championship match to WPIAL power Sewickley Academy, 3-2. It was rematch of the 2011 state title encounter, won by Panthers — who hadn’t tasted gold since until Saturday night.
Sewickley completed an unbeaten 24-0 through its slate with the triumph, which included a 3-2 win over Lower Moreland in the semifinal morning session at HRC.
The Spartans, also gunning for an unblemished run, had reached the final by knocking off Knoch by a 3-2 count in their semifinal encounter. Mike Gyomber — in his first year of a second go-round as girls’ head coach — and crew finished the campaign with a 16-1 mark and silver medals.
Wyo won both doubles matches versus SA but was swept on all three singles courts. Spartan tandems of Mackenzie Reese and Bella A’ddesi at top doubles (6-2, 6-2) and Emily Weidner and Aly Saad at No. 2 (6-4, 7-5) came through. But a third point never materialized.
“Our doubles were really strong, really happy with doubles,” Gyomber said. “I wasn’t sure what was gonna happen there but they just carried points for us and it was an amazing accomplishment. We just needed one point in the singles and we had a shot at it. But you’ve got to play the matches and Sewickley was strong where they needed to be, in those top three positions.”
Sewickley’s Evelyn Safar, Simran Bedi and Christina Walton swept their singles tilts to clinch it for the Panthers. Safar beat Wyo No. 1 Vittoria D’Addesi 6-1, 6-0; Bedi clipped District 3-AA singles champ Alex Jadic 7-5, 6-2 at No. 2; Walton beat Jasmine Wang 6-3, 6-0 at third singles.
It’s been seven years since SA last hoisted a gold state trophy. The moment was not lost on veteran coach Whit Snyder.
“I’m extremely proud of them,” Snyder said of his squad. “We had an influx last year of six freshman and we lost in the semifinals here. There were tears, but good tears, motivating tears. The girls worked extremely hard. We start six sophomore and one senior and they’re all very unselfish and they put in a lot of time in outside the program.
“What helped a lot is that we played a lot of triple-A competition during the season, teams like North Allegheny, Shady Side, Mount Lebanon, Upper Saint Clair, Fox Chapel, those type of teams, which are all tremendous programs. You learn what you have when you play those type of teams. It’s a privilege to be in this moment.”
Snyder said there was never any real internal talk about running the table.
“We never really even talked about that,” he said. “There was no focus on an undefeated season. There was talk of, ‘hey, we’re playing a triple-A team and they’re really good, so let’s do our best and learn from that.’ … the fun thing about a team sport is that you get to share it.”
