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Hope Christian teams oust PHS

Staff report

ALBUQUERQUE — Hope Christian quickly erased any hope Portales High’s tennis teams had of advancing on in Friday’s quarterfinals of Class 1A-3A state team competition at Albuquerque Academy H.S.

The Huskies posted a sweep, the second-seeded boys cruising to a 9-0 win while the fourth-seeded girls downed the fifth-seeded Lady Rams 7-2.

The lone winners for the PHS girls were junior McKenzie Bucksath, who defeated Ashley Tafoya 6-3, 6-4 at No. 5 singles, and juniors Samantha Lopez and Belle Youngerwolf, who notched a 6-1, 6-2 victory over Tafoya and Jana Pruitt at No. 3 doubles.

The Hope girls squad consists of one senior, two freshman and four eighth-graders.

“We thought we had them on experience, but their girls have been taking lessons for a long time,” PHS coach Ann-Marie Bucksath said. “Overall, though, we played well.”

The boys lost all of their matches in straight sets, although in several cases they did manage to win four or five games off the Huskies.

Rams coach Logan Brown said with everyone coming back, his squad is looking to the future.

“Of course, we’re disappointed to lose, but we’re happy to have made it,” Brown said. “There’s a lot of teams that wanted to be there and weren’t.”

Semifinals and finals in team competition are on tap today at Academy.