By Garth Shanklin
Sports Editor

The Glen Este Trojans tennis team didn’t win a single match last season. The team only had five players, and entering 2016 the squad’s top singles player from last year is no longer on the team after graduating last May.

Add all that up, and you have a young team with plenty of chances to grow as the regular season gets under way. Head coach Kevin Ammerman said he sees a few players who have already grown from last season, notably junior Emily Robison.

“It’s still early in the season, but I see my second singles from last year stepping up to first singles, and that’s a challenge to her,” Ammerman said. “She’s up to it. She’s willing and has a good optimistic view on it. The other three have improved over the course of last year heading into this year. It’s still a bit of a learning time for everyone still, but we’re out there to win as many matches as we can and to have fun doing it.”

Ammerman said Robison has the attention of the team, as they clearly look to her as the team’s leader.

“She’s definitely the leader,” Ammerman said. “They all look to her. This is her third year, so she’s played every year in high school.”

The team returned four of last year’s five players, and added three more this season.

“We have three new players, so this year we’re up to seven,” Ammerman said. “Two of them are juniors, one of them is a sophomore. All three are totally brand new to tennis. They all picked it up midway through July, so they’re still opportunities for improvement there.”

As the team improves, the hope is that they’ll be able to achieve their main goal this season: winning a match.

“Hopefully, we can win a match as a school, that’d be paramount for us.” Ammerman said. “Individually, hopefully we just continue to learn and get better. Even if we can’t string enough together for a whole school victory, we’ll give it our best shot.”

Milford is facing a similar rebuilding situation this season. According to head coach Claire Smalley, the team has a lot of players who will be gaining experience as the season progresses.

“We had a lot of girls that didn’t have any varsity experience,” Smalley said. “It’s their turn to play if they’re ready or not, and that’s hard to do in Cincinnati with some of the best tennis being played.”

Still, the team does have three seniors on the roster. Nicole Spencer, Claire LaFrance and Mallory Faler will be expected to lead a youthful Lady Eagles team this season.

“Their leadership is invaluable,” Smalley said. “We have a very young team with kids graduating and those that didn’t come back, they are going to have to help the younger kids battle through it, because even though we may lose we need to keep a positive attitude up.”

Junior Amanda Reinhart had a solid season in 2015, advancing to the district tournament. Smalley expects her to improve even more this season, and the coach said she has already shown improvement this year.

“I expect her to be even better,” Smalley said. “She beat Caitlin Fisher from Turpin, whom she had never beat before. Somehow she gets better every year, exponentially so. She has her own individual goals, and I’m expecting more from her.”

In terms of the newer players on the team this year, they’ll be introduced to the game slowly through doubles play, according to Smalley.

“The freshman will be playing doubles,” Smalley said. “I’m expecting them to believe they can win even though it’s a tough league.”

Even with all the team’s youth, they still have lofty goals as a team. Winning the conference may be difficult, but that’s not the only goal the team has in 2016.

“The goal is to win the ECC, which will be hard,” Smalley said. “We want to make sure we did better than what we do last year. We don’t want to use the excuse that we’re new, just trying to gain experience. We just want to improve on last season, which is a very attainable goal.”