By Mike Hutchens, UC Schools Communications Director
Union City, Tenn.–Union City dug deep to get itself out of a hole and to the girls’ state tennis tournament.
Rallies in two critical singles matches by Erin Gill and Gracyn Callicott propelled the Lady Tornadoes to the Small Division Final 4 and a spot in next week’s Spring Fling after a 4-2 victory over Trinity Christian Academy in Thursday’s sectional round.
UC, which will be making its eighth appearance all-time in the team portion of the state event, will play defending champion Signal Mountain Tuesday afternoon at 3 at the Adams Tennis Complex in Murfreesboro. The championship is set for Wednesday at 1:30 p.m.
The Twister girls punched their ticket to the state tournament the old-fashioned way: They earned it.
Having beaten TCA rather handily earlier in the season, UC had a stern challenge in every match Thursday and needed its quality depth in a revamped order to finally put away the visitors.
Gill, the fifth seed, lost her first set 4-6, before coming back to win 6-4 and 6-4 over Payton Yarbrough to give the Purple and Gold a 2-1 lead when her match was finished.
The sophomore’s gritty play was a continuation of her recent upward trend that included a critical win over Halls in the regional tourney last week and another victory in a critical spot vs. Greenfield earlier.
The effort of Callicott, the rising freshman standout, was simply amazing.
She, who was bumped up to the three-seed from her usual four-spot due to an injury to Gussie Parks, twice saved match points in the third and deciding set of a marathon vs. Elizabeth Hurt that lasted nearly four hours.
Down 5-1 at one time, Callicott – whose patient volleying style was sprinkled with precise shot-making – rallied to force a tie-breaker, which she won 7-1.
“Gill’s match was huge,” an obviously-pleaded UC head coach Tom Sisco said afterward. “I picked up on that when she got to that third set when I saw how a couple of the other matches were going. She’s come so far since she was a freshman. She just had an attitude that she wasn’t going to lose and had some great ground strokes.
“Her matches of late have been the lynchpin that have vaulted us on.
“As far as Gracyn, you just cannot give up on her. I’ve said it so many times before, there’s just something about her mental edge that is just way above her age. She doesn’t give up.”
Parks, the usual No. 2 singles seed who played at No. 4 Thursday, battled through shoulder issues to win in straight sets over Emily Russell (6-4, 6-1).
She then teamed with No. 1 doubles partner Meg Kizer to close out the match following Callicott’s lengthy battle to close out the match with an 8-3 win over Reed and Rebecca Warren.
“Gussie was spent from Monday when she had to play essentially three matches that made for a very long day,” Sisco added. “She’s had shoulder problems – possibly a torn labrum – doctors say. She got some meds earlier in the day and I think they hurt her stomach. After warm-ups, she came to me and said she thought she need to be bumped down.
“I thought she did a great job of gutting it out though, and I was really proud of the other girls who had to get bumped up to play a higher seed because of her injury.”
Junior Zoe Cagle put up a great fight playing at No. 2, rallying for a first-set tie-break win before dropping the final two sets to Macy Reed (7-6, 3-6, 4-6).
Kizer was beaten in straight sets of her No. 1 match by Isabella Colbert (3-6, 5-7).
UC now turns its attention to the state tournament, where they finished as state runners-up in 1999 and 2000, and made four straight trips from 2012-15. The Lady Tornadoes’ last trip to the team portion of the event was two years ago.
“We’re blessed to be one of four teams left in small division, no doubt,” Sisco concluded. “I think it speaks volumes about where our program is at this time, and we certainly know we’ll face some outstanding competition in Signal Mountain.
“We don’t want to say we’ve just gone (to the state tournament), though. We want to compete and compete well. Our goal is to get that elusive state championship for the first time ever.”
Photo by Mike Hutchens.
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