by Tom Utescher

A rain-soaked September scuttled many scheduled matches for the Penn Charter tennis team, but the Quakers kept their skills sharp and last Wednesday they recorded their second consecutive 7-0 victory in this soggy season.

In the middle of the month, the PC girls had swept a non-league contest against Central High School, and last week Charter opened the Inter-Ac League campaign by overcoming visiting Springside Chestnut Hill Academy. SCH had been able to fit in two Inter-Ac matches the previous week, when the Blue Devils bowed to the Academy of Notre Dame and Germantown Academy.

Two seasoned singles players are the co-captains for the Penn Charter team this fall, seniors Brinlea La Barge and Leila Sor. Last Wednesday La Barge, who is the niece of Springside Chestnut Hill head coach Ashley Vandegrift, went through at first singles 6-0, 6-0 against Blue Devils freshman Whitney Taylor, whose chief focus is squash, not tennis.

Sor’s scores were identical at second singles, where she faced fellow senior Leslie King. The third singles bout featured a pair of juniors, with PC’s J.J. Birnie besting visitor Kellie Graves, 6-1, 6-0.

The Blue Devils won more games in doubles play, although in the end PC prevailed in all four contests. The two schools split sets in an all-sophomore first flight, where Julia Barrist and Emma Schotsch of SCH opened with a 6-3 win and Charter’s Olivia Schwartz and Makayla Fradin took the second set at 6-0. Because the outcome of the overall match had been decided by this time, a super tiebreaker was played in lieu of a full third set, and here the Quakers’ pair emerged on top, 10-6.

PC seniors Emily Goldberg and Gabby Petrone won 6-0, 6-4 over the Blue Devils’ second doubles tandem, juniors Betty Li and Meghan Franklin.

The third flight went to senior Lucy Alter and sophomore Evie Eisenstein of the home team, who topped SCH junior Joi Rae Connor and freshman Cameron Golden, 6-1, 6-2. Quakers seniors Emily Schwartz and Lexie Kaiser captured a fourth doubles victory, 6-3, 6-0, facing juniors Emma Schwendermann and Dominique Regli of the visiting side.

UPDATE: On Friday Penn Charter appeared well on the way to a second league triumph when the Quakers claimed the first three matches to be completed at Germantown Academy. Giving PC the early advantage were La Barge at first singles, Birnie at third singles, and Kaiser and Emily Schwartz at fourth doubles.

As it turned out, the host Patriots fought back to 3-3 in the team score thanks to doubles victories by Alice Su and Amanda Li (first flight), Julia Ostrovsky and Devon Gelman (second), and Haley Marks and Sadie Andra (third). With the team victory on the line at second singles, GA’s Tiffany Zhong overcame PC’s Sor, 7-6 (7-5), 4-6, 1-0 (5).