The Tooele High School girls tennis team dropped to 1-1 in region matches Tuesday with a home loss to Springville 5-0. The individual matches were competitive, but Tooele coach Ryan Harris said most of his players were intimidated by the athleticism of the Red Devils.

“Springville has a bunch of exceptional competitors. None of them are really tennis specialists, but the are all athletic and strong-willed,” Harris said.

Tooele’s first singles player Megan Heder and the first doubles team of Amanda Bento and Megan Bresee were close to pulling out victories.

Heder dropped her match to Chelsi Dalton 6-4, 6-3 and the No.1 doubles team was able to push the match to 6-4, 6-4. Second singles player Paige Dimond played a strong second set in her 6-2, 6-4 loss.

“It was evident that we were intimidated. It was a great opportunity for us to be mentally tough by focusing our intentions in the face of such competitive opponents. With the exception of Megan Heder, we did not even approach a relaxed and focused state of being,” the coach said.

The coach is optimistic that his team will be prepared when they play at Springville later in the year. “It will be fun to see how well we can compete against them at their place. I think we can catch them off-guard.”

Springville’s Ashley Kroneburger downed Kylee Harris 6-1, 6-1 at third singles while Courtney Smith and Carolina Garrido defeated Tooele’s Amanda Dunn and Kenna Stwart at second doubles 6-2, 6-2.

Grantsville tennis

The traditional strong Grantsville girls tennis team is off to a great start to open the 2008 season. The Cowgirls already overpowered two teams from higher class divisionbefore they started the school year, whitewashing 5A team Lehi 5-0, and thumping 4A team Box Elder 4-1.The team also lost a hard fought battle against 4A Highland 4-1, but recovered after meeting 3A foe Emery capturing a 5-0 win.

Mark Watson: mwatson@tooeletranscript.com