Cardinals women’s tennnis team young but should be competitive
BY Rob Wollenzien For Sun-Times Media August 27, 2011 4:50PM
Updated: November 30, 2011 12:22AM
Last spring may have been the best thing that could have happened to the North Central College women’s tennis team.
Then-junior Cory Schillerstrom (Naperville Central) sat out the spring season to focus on an important class she was taking at the time and then-senior Alicia DeGrado missed the spring schedule to run track. Those circumstances left the Cardinals without their top two players and with 2011 senior Abigail Conover (Naperville North) as the lone upperclassman.
Now that No. 1 player Schillerstrom is a senior surrounded by a youth movement, the players around her will be accustomed to picking up the slack.
“We’re going to be a young team but they’ll be competitive,” coach Don Moravec says. “We had some kids who stepped up in the spring and we hope they can step up again this season. We should have a pretty good year. I’m optimistic that the younger kids will come through.”
Schillerstrom, a three-time all-CCIW player, will play both No. 1 singles and doubles. She’ll be joined in the lineup by junior Katie Hatch, sophomores Stephanie Brunetti, Madeline Urban and Maggie Youel, and freshmen Reynolds Cross and Jessica Froidcoeur.
Everyone will be expected to contribute, as those seven are the only student-athletes to come out for tennis this fall. Normally, NCC fields a junior varsity team — and schedule — due to a turnout in the 14-player range. This year, there will only be a varsity squad.
The Cardinals completed the spring portion of their 2011 schedule 1-2 in three dual meets. In the fall of 2010, they compiled an impressive 10-3 overall record.
NCC finished the ’10 fall season fifth in the CCIW, narrowly missing the spring tournament. The top four teams from the fall season participate in the spring tournament.
