Girls tennis advances to Central Jersey, Group 1 final

Coach Stephanie Leonardis looks at the remaining action with Nira Patel after her second-singles victory sealed the team win.

Friday (Oct. 14) afternoon the Roselle Park High School girls’ tennis team served up a clean sweep of Dayton to advance to the Central Jersey, Group 1 finals.

All three singles and both doubles matches were won by the Panthers, the second seed in the NJSIAA state sectional tournament. Dayton came in as the third seed. The girls advanced to play the Bulldogs in the semifinals following a win over Spotswood (4-1) on Oct. 11.

Roselle Park, under first-year coach Stephanie Leonardis, is now 10-5 overall.

Senior Ny-Aziah Valle was the first to put away her opponent, Talia Farber, with a dominating 6-0, 6-0 performance at third singles.

Adjacent to her, the first-doubles duo of seniors Caitlyn Nicol and Amparo Sanchez promptly beat their Bulldogs foes, handing them breadsticks at 6-1, 6-1.

Caitlyn Nicol, Angela Leonardis, Nira Patel, Ny-Aziah Valle, and Amparo Sanchez pose for a quick pic as they watch Jocelyn Swyberius and Sylvia Altman play behind them.

Attention then turned to courts 1 and 2 where junior Nira Patel at second-singles was taking on sophomore Liv Lander, and Angela Leonardis was battling Dayton frosh Cristina Moreira at first singles.

The first to break through was Patel, giving RP its third win in the best-of-five team match. Patel won handily, 6-2, 6-4.

Having seen the results of the matches around her, Leonardis still went for the ‘W,’ even after dropping the first set 4-6. The sophomore rallied to take the second set 6-4. Then, because the team match had already determined, Leonardis and Moreira went right into a 10-point tiebreaker instead of playing a third set. Leonardis took the tiebreak, 10-4.

Before celebrating, the girls watched the second doubles team – senior Sylvia Altman and soph Jocelyn Swyberius – dispose of Dayton’s Amelia Cox and Cecilia Perez, 6-4, 6-3.

UPDATE: A very successful season came to end for the girls and first-year coach Stephanie Leonardis on Oct. 18 in the finals against New Providence. RP lost, 5-0. Girls tennis finished with a record of 11-6.