Girls tennis | Piedmont has good depth to start season

Piedmont High School’s girls tennis team is entering the season with a significant strength in team tennis: depth.

The Highlanders sport strong players up and down the ladder. Freshman Ella Ruthven opened the year at the top of the ladder, defeating returning senior Kate Jumper in a challenge match. Junior Faith Chin is No. 3 and senior Arianna Kortum is No. 4.

“Ella is a good competitor,” coach Jim Landes said. “Her forehand can be powerful. She’s very tenacious. And doesn’t make many mistakes especially on the big points. She can drop shot, her serve can be very good. Her second serve is slow so she can be vulnerable. During her match (against College Prep in the opener) I told her slow your first serve down and get it in because she’s hurting you on the second serve. She’s fast, she gets a lot of balls back. She’s a very good defensive player at the moment.”

Jumper may yet return to the No. 1 slot.

“Kate has more power, can play more offense, Kate can come up to the net,” Landes said. “They both have some variety.”

Chin has been working hard at her game.

“She’s a good all-around player,” Landes said. “She has good strokes, she’s serving pretty nicely, she has a great volley. Her forehand can be off. She can play really well. She’s really dedicated. She practices maybe more than the others.”

Kortum has the best serve of the top four.

“Arianna may have the best strokes on the team,” Landes said. “She could be the best player if she played a little bit more. Arianna played a very close challenge match with Kate.”

Landes added, “All four singles players are pretty even.”

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The coach said the doubles are where depth pays off. Senior Samantha Huynh and junior Emma Chan make up the No. 1 team.

“They both have very quick reflexes,” Landes said. “They’re good at the net. They’re not super groundstrokers. They can keep it going and Emma actually has gotten better with her groundstrokes. She’s hitting some very good forehands.”

The No. 2 team is seniors Maddie Tran and Inara Mehta.

“Maddie can really play well if she puts her mind to it and works hard,” Landes said. “She has a lot of athletic ability. Strong, powerful ground strokes. Inara is steady.”

A pair of sophomores form the No. 3 team: Chiara Silvio and Ella Thomasson. Another player in the mix is sophomore Leela Sivakumar.

The Highlanders should be competitive in the West Alameda County Conference Foothill Division again this year. The North Coast Section has changed its playoff structure slightly, going from two divisions to three. Teams will be placed in the brackets (Open, Division 1 and Division 2) based on their overall UTR Power 10 ratings (each player will have one) but the seeding committee can use other factors to move teams up and down within the brackets.

Piedmont opened the season on Aug. 21 with a 7-0 win at home against College Prep. Ruthven defeated Sophia Bitton in a tight No. 1 singles match, 2-6, 7-6 (4), 10-8.

“Bitton has a much higher UTR than Ella and this may have given her a psychological edge in the first set,” Landes said. “However, Ella didn’t lose belief in herself and began to really steady down in the second set and fought her way into the match.”

“She saved two match points on Sophia’s serve at 5-4 in the second set and then brought it to a tiebreak.  The third set 10-point tie break was also a battle with Ella down 8-5 and then winning five straight points to close out the match.”

Jumper beat Lulu Simons at No. 2, 6-1, 6-1. Chin handled Gia Chhabra at No. 3, 6-1, 6-4. And Kortum double-bageled Sophia Roh at No. 4.

In doubles, Huynh and Chan defeated Daphne Green and Surina Pugh at No. 1, 6-4, 6-2. Tran and Mehta beat Hana and Maya Alhamadsheh at No. 2 in another good match, 6-4, 3-6, 10-7. Thomasson and Silvio downed Irene Moore and Sophie Downs, 6-0, 6-2.

Piedmont’s next match is against University-San Francisco at the Goldman Tennis Center in Golden Gate Park on Aug. 27.