Monarchs answer call

NEWPORT BEACH — Sage Hill School girls’ tennis coach A.G. Longoria waited and waited for a phone call prior to the Lightning’s nonleague match against Mater Dei on Monday.

Then he got it, and the match’s dynamics took a turn for the worse before any balls had been struck.

Lightning sophomore Julia Blakeley, a transfer from University High whom Longoria has called the most talented player to ever attend Sage Hill, was not cleared to play Monday because the proper paperwork had not yet been filed with the CIF Southern Section office.

Blakeley has yet to play for Sage Hill this season.

“There are two forms you have to fill out,” Longoria said. “We got the second form from Uni at 2:45 [p.m. on Monday], and faxed it to the CIF office. We could have still gotten Julia in during the second or third round, but the call back from [Sage athletic director John Poffenberger] was that there was information missing on the form.”

Information and a top player both missing as the Lightning fell to the Monarchs, 12-6, at Balboa Bay Club Racquet Club.

But frustrating, too, because the Lightning (1-1) were competing better with Mater Dei (2-1) early. Each team took three sets in the first go-round, with Sage Hill junior Jaclyn Smrecek and sophomore Dominique Moore winning in singles and the doubles team of juniors Nandi Shah and Sarah Choi also prevailing.

The Division I Monarchs, who had lost to the Division IV Lightning in the previous two seasons, then won five of six sets in the second go-round to grab a commanding 8-4 lead.

Included in that was a set in which Mater Dei’s Neda Ghassemi, a Corona del Mar resident, outlasted Smrecek, 7-6, 8-6 in the tiebreaker. Ghassemi saved two match points for the narrow win.

“That definitely helped our team,” said Mater Dei No. 1 singles player Rachel Cox, another CdM resident who won two of three sets. “It’s always good to win those close ones. When [Sage Hill] beat us the last two years, it probably brought us down a little. It’s good to keep our name.”

After the match, Longoria told his team that Sage Hill needed to be more consistent. The Lightning won the eight-team SCTA First-Serve tournament Saturday at Orange Coast College.

“This is like baseball,” Longoria said to his players. “You can be down and still come back. You’re never out of it. We have to run harder, we have to challenge everything.”

But Longoria later said that he wasn’t too upset at his team over the loss.

“Obviously, I would have loved to have beaten Mater Dei, but you can’t beat anyone unless you can stay close,” he said. “That’s how you get an upset; you keep them close and put pressure on them. But judging it by the youth and inexperience this team has, I’m not that upset. I’m just trying to point out to them so they know what we have to do. Hopefully we’ll get better and better, little by little each time.”

Shah won two sets in doubles, one with Choi and one with Samantha Murray, and Sage Hill’s No. 1 doubles team of senior Danielle Goodman and junior Isa-Marie Taskinen also won a set.

Sage Hill next plays host to the four-team Lightning Invitational tournament on Friday and Saturday at Balboa Bay Club Racquet Club.

“We have three good days of practice, then three matches over the weekend,” Longoria said. “Hopefully we’ll start putting our regular doubles teams together; we’re still experimenting.”