The Caribou girls’ tennis team has already pulled upsets over its last two playoff opponents and another one this morning would give the program yet another Eastern Maine championship.
The Vikings, the No. 6 seed, stopped No. 11 Winslow in a Class B preliminary playoff match last Wednesday, and then proceeded to make bus trips south to down No. 3 Waterville in Thursday’s quarterfinal and No. 2 John Bapst in Saturday’s semifinal.
Caribou meets up against Mount Desert Island, the No. 1 seed, in the regional finals this morning at Colby College in Waterville. The Vikes met up against the Trojans way back on April 18 to kick off the regular season, losing by a 4-1 score. It was one of only two losses suffered by the Vikings this spring.
The winner of the match will advance to Saturday’s state championship, to be played at Bates College in Lewiston Saturday.
Caribou scored consecutive 4-1 road victories over the Panthers and Crusaders late last week to earn a berth in the title match. In the victory over Bapst, Conner Spencer and Makayla Bouchard won in second and third singles, respectively, while both doubles teams also prevailed. In one match, Ashley Matlock and Ciara Richards came back from a first-set loss to beat Crystal Bell and Alice Podolsky, 3-6, 6-4, 6-4. In the other, Danielle Hanson and Taylor Fournier-Belanger won in straight sets.
The Vikes swept past Winslow at home last Wednesday, 5-0, with Gabrielle Marquis, Spencer and Bouchard garnering easy straight-set victories and the two doubles combinations also coming out on top.
For the boys, Caribou earned a 4-1 triumph over MDI in the quarterfinals Thursday before losing at Ellsworth in the semis Saturday, also by a 4-1 score.
In the win, Brendan Cyr prevailed in No. 2 singles and Ethan Plourde failed to drop a single game in routing his opponent in third singles. Alec Cyr and Austin Scott took the No. 1 doubles match, while Austin Cheplic and Seth Beidelman won in second doubles.
On Saturday, the only Viking player able to win an individual match was Brendan Cyr, who took down Alec Toothaker, 6-3, 7-5.
The Caribou boys, who went into the playoffs as the No. 4 seed, finished up with a 13-2 overall mark.
