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Champions: Athletes from Reynolds, East Surry and Calvary Baptist bring home state titles
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Chloe Willetts of Reynolds won the Class 4-A singles tennis title.
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Published: November 3, 2009
As Chloe Willetts of Reynolds watched Grace Baker of Charlotte Myers Park play a semifinal match in the NCHSAA 4-A tennis championships Saturday at N.C. State, nervousness started setting in.
But Willetts, a freshman, then went out and defeated Baker — a junior, three-time finalist and 2008 champion — 6-4, 4-6, 6-3 in a match that lasted two hours, 15 minutes.
Willetts was one of three area athletes to win individual championships last weekend. East Surry's Megan Shelton won the NCHSAA 1-A singles tennis title, and Calvary Baptist's Scott Morgan won the NCISAA 2-A/1-A cross-country title.
Willetts, an accomplished USTA junior player, said she was as excited by winning the state championship as she would be with winning any tournament.
"The only thing different is it was for the state," Willetts said yesterday. "I felt like winning this was like winning a national tournament or any other tournament I would be playing in.
"I wasn't sure if I was going to win or not. I just wanted to go out there and play. I wanted to do it for my school since it hadn't been done in 25 years. I just really wanted to win."
Willetts became the first Reynolds girl to win the 4-A singles title since Spencer Barnes in 1984. Her victory also gave Reynolds both NCHSAA 4-A singles champs — Robbie Mudge, now a junior, won the boys title last spring.
Coach Brad Fisher of Reynolds — who said he caught grief for pumping Willetts as a title contender — said he felt justified in his confidence.
Fisher said that the defining moment of the match came with the score tied 3-3 in the third set, with Willetts serving in a game that went to four straight deuce points.
"That was the point right there where I knew she would be able to do it," Fisher said. "If she went down 4-3, and Grace had serve, I didn't like our chances. She beat Grace in that fifth deuce (point), and I think that defeated Grace, then she turned around and broke Grace."
Fisher said that the score teetered throughout the match.
"Out of 188 total points played, Chloe won six more, and that's how back-and-forth it was," Fisher said.
Willetts didn't teeter at all when asked if she would bypass next year's NCHSAA championships for a USTA tournament. "I would definitely like to play the next three years," she said, "and hopefully win the next three years."
Fisher said he was pleased to see Willetts show some emotion after winning instead of her usual stoic demeanor.
"She is six feet tall, and she is such a strong player," he said. "Her forehand is punishing to some girls, and it helps with her size. Chloe just blows some girls off the court with power, and she trains with the boys, so she plays like a boy. She just plays an overpowering style."
In the 1-A singles final, East Surry's Shelton, a senior, defeated Lori Wang of Raleigh Charter 6-1, 6-4 for the title.
In cross country Friday, Calvary's Morgan was faster than any NCISAA runner at Greensboro's Hagan-Stone Park, regardless of classification. He won the 2-A/1-A title in 15 minutes, 30 seconds, covering the 3.1-mile course eight seconds faster than the winner of the 3-A title.
Morgan gained a measure of revenge in defeating runner-up Bobby Mintz of Cary Christian by 11 seconds. Last fall, Mintz won the 2-A/1-A title with a one-second win over runner-up Morgan.
"We started off together, and he was actually leading the race," Morgan said. "We did a pretty fast first half-mile, then came through at 4:54 in the first mile. There is a hill right before two miles, and I was behind, and I sprinted ahead of him and beat him through two miles and extended my lead through the last mile.
"He outsprinted me last year, and he is faster at sprinting, so I wanted to break away from him during the race instead of at the end and it ended up working."
Morgan said that losing the title as a sophomore was "a great motivator," and that he ran 60 to 80 miles each week during the summer, about 40 miles a week more than he ran in the summer of 2008.
"I thought he could run 15:30, but I am not sure I would pick that day," Coach Rick Bray of Calvary said. "He likes to run in the cold and when it's raining, but he really stepped up big and it was awesome to see."
mlinker@wsjournal.com.
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