Chesterton girls tennis survives at Crown Point, 3-2, and faces Lake Central in a class of DAC unbeatens Thursday at Chesterton

Tom Keegan
Onwardtrojans.com

A busy Tuesday of competition on the Chesterton athletic fields of competition had come to a close.
The baseball team had lost an entertaining 3-1 game to Crown Point. The softball team hung with Lake Central for four innings until a 1-1 contest gradually turned into a 12-1 loss.
Sprinters broke records for a rising Chesterton girls track and field team that defeated Merrillville and Portage.
Night had fallen and the tennis players were on their way home as the Duneland School Corporation driver wheeled the empty bus out of the parking. Tennis coach Tom Bour was carrying equipment into a storage shed, his final task after a stressful day, but he was more than happy to stop and take the time to discuss the team’s match at Crown Point. For one thing, that’s who Bour is as a person, never feeling too burdened by his busy schedule to make the time to draw attention to the athletes he coaches. For another, he just might have figured he would not be able to get to sleep for a while anyway, his energy level still high from the excitement of the match.
Chesterton defeated Crown Point, 3-2, on the Bulldogs’ beautiful courts in front of their fans, which made for what Bour called, “a great atmosphere.”
The win set up a battle of DAC teams unbeaten in conference play between visiting Lake Central (10-1, 4-0, No. 27 in the state) and Chesterton (7-2, 4-0, unranked) scheduled for Thursday.
Chesterton’s three points at Crown Point came from the No. 1 doubles team of Aleksa Sorgic and Ameila Smith, who improved their record to 9-1, and No. 2 doubles Anisa Faroh and Lauren Pilarski, who are 10-0, and No. 3 singles player, freshman Kendall Gallion.
“It all came down to 1 doubles at the end,” Bour recounted of the match that drew the attention of everyone in attendance because it was the last one going and would determine the winner. “Match was tied at 2 all and we were going into a third set at 1 doubles. We played just a beautiful third set. We were aggressive. Crown Point was very good, full of energy, very aggressive, but to Alexa and Amelia’s credit they overcame that huge crowd they had, and got out to a good lead and never relinquished it. It was a great atmosphere.”
The night ended far better than the day started for the Trojans.
“The first hour-and-a-half we lost all three first sets at singles, badly, and I’m like, ‘Ah, OK, it’s all ending tonight.’ Then the doubles won their first sets easily, so we’re like ‘OK, let’s just see what we can do here.’”
This wasn’t the first time Gallion overcame a rough start to prevail. She also did so at Valparaiso.
“I’m way at the other end of the courts and I look and I’m like, ‘Man, I think that says 5-0 us (in Gallion’s second set),’” Bour said.
That was when assistant coach Scott Garrison reassured Bour that everything was going to be just fine, saying, “We’re good, Coach. We just need these doubles not to mess up.”
They did their job. Sorgic and Smith won their match 6-1, 4-6, 6-2. Faroh and Pilarski, the first to finish, won theirs 6-2, 6-1. Gallion prevailed 2-6, 6-0, 6-2.
Writing on his Chesterton tennis Weebly website, Bour, a former sportswriter for the Michigan City Dispatch, called the night, “a classic exciting high school match, under the lights, tons of people and tons of pressure on those doubles teams out there at the end with the match results riding on their outcome. … It was a great atmosphere, and I wish more people could experience high school tennis when it comes down to the final match of the night.”
More people can Thursday night when Lake Central clashes with host Chesterton in a match that shapes up as a potential 3-2 outcome. It gets underway at 4:30 and admission is free.