Squaws top JCHS netters

Long after the rest of her teammates had left the court, Jessica Ooten was still fighting. She wouldn’t let the Patriots get shut out.
Ooten rallied from a first-set defeat and knocked off Maddie Werling 3-6, 6-4, 7-6 (7-5) to earn the lone point for Jay County as it suffered a 4-1 defeat Thursday to the visiting Bellmont Squaws.
“Jessica plays with such composure,” said JCHS coach Susan Garringer of the senior. “She stays confident through the whole match. … She can place the ball consistently all the time, and her first serve was going in tonight a lot, which definitely helped her. …
“She lost a couple matches last year that went to three sets, and that disappointed her. This is a big win for Jessica.”
After dropping the first set, Ooten and Werling went back-and-forth over the course of the next two leading to the tiebreaker.
Ooten fell behind 3-1 with the match on the line, but got a break when Werling double-faulted to make the score 3-2. Ooten went on to score five straight points to take control, one of which came on a drop shot just over the net after she chased Werling to the back of the court with a lob.
Werling closed the gap to 6-5 before giving Ooten the win on another double fault.
“It was tough,” said Ooten, noting that she wasn’t very confident after the opening set. “I just wanted to try my hardest and come back.
“I just had this drive in me.”
Ooten bounced back from her first-set defeat to take the first three games of the second en route to a 6-4 win. She dropped the first two games of the third set before winning four in a row.
Werling pulled even again at 4-4 and took a 6-5 lead before Ooten forced the tiebreaker.
Jay County (1-1), which topped Blackford Tuesday in its season opener, won just a total of six games in the other four matches.
Half of those came at No. 2 doubles, where Mackenzie McIntire and Brittany Stevens trailed just 3-2 in the second set after dropping the first. But Taya Adams and Rachel Baumgarter put together a run of three straight games to hand the JCHS duo a 6-1, 6-3 loss.
“I’m happy with how they’re playing,” said Garringer of McIntire and Stevens. “I think they have a pretty strong net game. Both of them are pretty strong (at volleying).”
Alyssa Rigby won a game in each set at No. 1 singles as she fell 6-1, 6-1 to Allison Gutierrez. Melinda Penrod picked up a game early in her match against Alysha Helmach at No. 3 singles, but dropped the final 10 in a row for a 6-1, 6-0 defeat.
And at No. 1 doubles, a strong service game from Bellmont’s Andrea Fructe and Shelby Riess led to a 6-0, 6-0 loss for the Patriots’ Alicia Degler and Kyla McKibben.
Jay County dropped the junior varsity match 5-2, earning its points at No. 3 singles and No. 5 doubles.
Katy Smeltzer picked up the lone singles victory for the Patriots, winning 8-6 over Amberly Gutierrez. Mackenzie Overholser and Chelsea Russel defeated Chloe Mock and Katie Hackman 8-3.


[[In-content Ad]]