THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, October 27, 1996 TAG: 9610250234
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 24 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY PAUL WHITE, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: 85 lines
YOU ARE A COX girls tennis player, and you're concentrating on your strokes during a key late-season practice when suddenly a popular song begins blaring from a nearby boombox. The beat is nice; it's also time to work on that slice.
So what do you do?
The Macarena. What else?
``You should have seen the football players looking over at them from their practice,'' one onlooker said.
But that's those crazy Falcons for you - never too pooped to party.
This loose, hip side of the players might come as a surprise to those who've followed girls tennis in these parts this season, because the Falcons' matches conjure up images of another kind of dance - the waltz. In carving out a remarkably smooth path to the Eastern Region title, Cox won all 14 of its team matches and 123 of 124 singles and doubles matches. Few teams in recent South Hampton Roads history have been as dominant.
Fewer still have probably had as much fun along the way.
If the Falcons' celebration of their regional title last week at Owls Creek Municipal Tennis Center seemed somewhat muted, it's because the Falcons know there's a bigger title to be won. Cox will host Northern Region runner-up Centreville at 11 a.m. Tuesday in the quarterfinals of the Group AAA state tournament, the first step toward securing the school's first state girls tennis crown.
But the Falcons also didn't want to get too carried away with winning the region because, as they'll admit, that title was something they pretty much knew they were going to win when practice started in August.
In Kristin Moran, Ashby Moran, Adrienne Byrne, Andrea Bussey and Elizabeth Hamlet, Cox had five players with considerable tournament experience. The majority of South Hampton Roads teams have no tournament players; only a handful have more than one.
Talented freshman Kristin Moran gave the Falcons a bonafide No. 1 player and promised to be one of the league's best. The players couldn't imagine any team having a No. 6 player as strong as Shannon Gormley. And in Morgan Ayers, Alicia Cooke, Maggie Gormley, Katy Dickinson and Jaclyn Hampton, the Falcons had reserves that probably would have made a respectable district showing had they broken away and formed their own team.
This paper may have picked the group to finish second to First Colonial, but the Falcons insist they knew better all along.
``We didn't expect all those 9-0s, but yeah, we kind of thought we were the best team,'' Byrne said.
With the confidence level of the players so high so soon, the task facing fourth-year coach Liane Long was to keep them motivated. So she began injecting light, fun touches into the team's practices, including cranking up the music during the team's practices.
The move was a masterstroke. For while football players may get pumped up by tough practices and rah-rah speeches, it turns out that the Falcon tennis players get off on ``Jock Jams'' like ``YMCA'' and ``Baby Got Back.''
``We call it our motivational music,'' Bussey said. ``It makes it feel like we're warming up for a real team sport.''
Too much fun at practice can be a dangerous thing, but the Falcons insist it's had the opposite effect for them.
``I think we play harder than we practice, but I've found that during the tennis season my level of play actually goes up,'' Bryne said.
``My skills are better during the winter,'' added Bussey, ``but my match focus is better now.''
Pre-match talks from Long centering on specific strengths, weaknesses and tactics helps ensure the players are focused on game day, the players said. The team's record, of course, bears this out.
But despite dominating this region, how much farther the Falcons can go remains to be seen. The power in Group AAA state tennis has been in the Central and Northern Regions for years. Any team the Falcons play this week will almost certainly be significantly tougher than anyone they've seen around here.
But the Falcons say when they reflect on this season, results will be secondary to things like the impromptu Macarena practice, the team dinners at Olive Garden, and the time they decorated the front door of Long's house with toilet paper and marshmallow whip.
``Sure we'd be disappointed (not winning a state title) because we wouldn't have achieved a goal,'' Byrne said. ``But I don't think you could call this season a failure.''
Added Bussey, ``How could anything this good could be called a failure?'' ILLUSTRATION: Staff photo by CHARLIE MEADS
In Kristin Moran, Cox has a talented freshman at No. 1 who has
promise of a very bright future.
KEYWORDS: HIGH SCHOOL GIRL TENNIS by CNB