100th Annual Southern California Junior Sectional Championships:

Stern heat dwindles Yelsey

Steve Virgen

FOUNTAIN VALLEY - Lori Stern and the elements showed no mercy on

Corona del Mar High standout Anne Yelsey in a girls 18s semifinal of the

100th annual Southern California Junior Sectional Tennis Championships at

the Los Caballeros Tennis Center Friday.

Stern (Ojai), the No. 2 seed, came back from a 2-0 deficit in games in

the pivotal third set to win the match, 6-4, 1-6, 6-3. Yelsey, ranked No.

1 in the 18s in Southern California, appeared to have run out of energy

and the momentum she displayed in a commanding 6-1 second-set victory.

“The one thing that failed me was conditioning, and that’s what I have

to work on,” said Yelsey, who lost in her first three-set match of the

junior sectionals. “I got up early (in the third set) and I needed to

stay with her. I started to get sluggish.”

Yelsey also said the heat withered her stamina and made for a

roller-coaster-ride experience. After losing the first set, Yelsey,

clearly frustrated, fed off her anger and responded with the 6-1 win.

“I was real upset that I lost the first set, and when I lost I get

mad, and I play better when I’m mad,” Yelsey said. “I was kind of holding

back a bit (in the first set).”

When Stern closed out the first set, Yelsey yelled to herself, “How

bad do you want to play, Anne?”

Then, Yelsey proceeded to grab complete control of the match. She

built a 5-0 lead. Her third and her fourth wins featured sweeps, as Stern

did not score a point.

Then Yelsey served to go up, 5-0, winning after one deuce. Stern could

not return Yelsey’s serve on the final two points.

After the second set, Yelsey worked to a 2-0 lead, but Stern won the

next five games, as Stern used the same successful aspects that worked

for Yelsey: serving, mixing up shots and emphatically putting away

winners.

“We have sort of the same type of games,” said Stern, who will play

for the University of Virginia in the fall. “We mix it up with our shots

and that made it hard to figure each other out. In the third set, I

started to think how I won in the first set and I started hitting a lot

of cross courts and she had to run.”

Yelsey will face top-seeded Lindsey Nelson (Orange) for third place,

today at 10:30 a.m. at Los Cab. Nelson lost to the No. 3 seed, Tracy Lin,

6-2. 7-6, in a rematch of December’s CIF-Southern Section singles title,

that Lin also won.

In other girls junior sectionals action:

In girls 18s, Natalie Braverman, a recent Newport Harbor graduate

bound for Pepperdine, advanced to the consolation championship match

after winning two matches Friday. Braverman, the sixth seed, will face

Monica Wiesener (Calabasas), the eighth seed, today at 12:30 p.m. at Los

Cab.

Braverman defeated fifth-seed and Sea View League rival Elizabeth Exon

(Woodbridge High), 6-0, 6-3, in a consolation quarterfinal. And,

Braverman also bested Leslie Koffi (Los Angeles), 6-2, 6-3, in a

consolation semifinal.