Ladies Tennis fights hard despite setback, loses league championship match to Jurupa Hills in tiebreak

Colton loses a key player on singles to illness, which is enough to give the Spartans the San Andreas League title

Pepper Bough Staff|October 20, 2022

Omar Menjivar

Jazmin Almazan and Natalie Diaz serve up two set victories in Colton’s frustrating loss to Jurupa Hills for the league championship on Oct. 19.

Fontana, CA—”Now this one truly is a heartbreaker,” said coach Omar Menjivar.

Colton’s ladies tennis team traveled to Jurupa Hills on Wednesday to face the 9-0 Spartans in their final regular season match. A victory over Jurupa Hills would have meant sharing the San Andreas League crown. Like their previous match, which required a 9-9 tiebreaker that went Jurupa’s way, this one also went the distance.

Jurupa Hills took the match and the league championship, winning the tiebreaker 77-72. Colton finishes in second place in San Andreas League with a record of 7-3*, qualifying them for a CIF team playoff bid.

At the last minute before the match, singles player Kimberly Emilio had to go home ill, leaving the Yellowjackets without one of their key athletes. Cecilia Flores took Emilio’s spot and struggled, losing all three of her sets 0-6, 1-6, 2-6.

However, the doubles teams made up for the lost sets, with the team of Jazmin Almazan and Natalie Diaz winning two of their three sets against the Spartans.

Shantel Marentes, holding on to the number one singles position, won her three sets 6-4, 6-3, 6-0. Emily Ramirez took two of three, 5-7, 6-2, 6-2.

Going into this match, Colton was on a five match winning streak, and had pushed the undefeated Spartans to a tiebreaker in their previous faceoff. The Pepper Bough reported about that heartbreak, but coach Menjivar did not share the paper’s perspective. He pointed out that the team started that previous match slowly, but picked up steam as it went on, with their tiebreak loss representing the idea that they could beat the Spartans.

This match, however, was different, but Menjivar remained proud of his athletes. “Even though we were short one strong singles player, we pushed it to the limit.”

Now, ladies tennis can look forward to the upcoming CIF league prelims and finals on Oct. 25 and 27. At that time, announcements will be made about upcoming CIF playoff matchups.

 

[Ed. Note] Correction: Going into the match, Colton was set to be 8-2, however they were required to forfeit the match against Carter High School on Oct. 12 due to the participation of an ineligible player.