Fallon junior Thomas Jamieson steps up to return the serve from Incline on Tuesday.
While the Wave boys and girls tennis teams shared dual wins in their season openers, the matches with Incline flipped the script, while the Lady Wave won at Incline 10-8 and the boys team lost at home, 12-6 on Tuesday.
The Lady Wave sits at 2-0 overall and in the Northern 3A, while the Wave boys will look to tip back at 1-1 with dual matches against South Tahoe at home and away respectively on Tuesday.
Lady Wave coach Jessica Nuckolls said her team had a good time on the road, though, the win was more of a challenge than their lax season opener against Sparks.
“I learned when you take a long road-trip you really need to get out and stretch a bit,” she said. “I think once we got up there, it being cooler weather and us being on a bus for two hours, my girls were a little stiff and kind of struggled a bit that first round, but once some of my singles players warmed they were playing a little better.”
Nuckolss’ doubles players rocked the first round, in her own words, beating each Incline duo 6-1, 6-2 and 6-2 including the first sight of the senior power couple of Izzy Martinez and Kayla Bekiares.
“Izzy and Kayla play really well together,” Nuckolls said on the duos 6-1, 6-2 and 6-0 victories. “They’re both really competitive and very mature in their game. They defend the net well, and I’m really proud of them.”
Martinez and Bekiares weren’t the only doubles standouts for the Lady Wave, the No. 2 team of seniors Paola Duenas and Mikaela McCormick won 6-2 across the board.
“This is Paola’s second year playing,” Nuckolls said. “They play well together with being opposites at what they’re good at which comes together really well in a doubles team.”
In the singles matches, Nuckolls’ daughter Melanie Nuckolls finally saw some court time, though, the healing process has not been kind with two match losses 6-1 and 6-2. Melanie won her second round 6-2, however, by making her opponent run a lot and displaying more control of the ball.
“It’s been about a month and a half since she really played so she really struggled at first,” coach Nuckolls said. “But I think she’s really looking forward to matching up with that Incline girl because she would really like that opportunity to try to beat her.”
Nuckolls said her three singles players as great athletes in light of Incline’s endurance, which she hopes her own players learn to adapt for themselves. Senior Lana Quint proved the Lady Wave can perform under pressure winning her third round 6-2 which tipped the tie in Fallon’s favor.
The boys team managed to pull away with a few points, such as in dual tiebreakers won by the duo of Blake Malkovich and Ben Jamieson, 6-2 and 6-1 which boys coach Jesse Nuckolls said made a difference.
“They did a really good job of keeping us in the match,” he said. “Incline is a tough team and will always be a challenge for us, but we’re going to do better the next time we meet up with them.”
The opposite luck plagued Fallon in two other rounds which lost at the tiebreaker and the other 7-5.
“The score doesn’t reflect where we’re going to be next time we play them,” Nuckolls said of Incline. “Had they won those this would’ve been a different score. So I think the next time we play them it’s going to be different and closer, and we’re looking forward to improving.”