Girls sectional tennis: Medina doubles team can't pull off another comeback

BATH TWP. — Oblivious to pressure and refusing to believe they are ever out of a match, Medina doubles players Ella Bresler and Nellie Alber dared to dream big. It nearly came true. After coming back to pull off two improbable victories Wednesday at the Springside Division I Sectional, the juniors nearly did it again Thursday before falling 6-0, 3-6, 6-4 to Strongsville's Mia Gyure and Kadison Rood in quarterfinal play at Springside Athletic Club. A win would have guaranteed the unseeded Bees the top-four finish needed to advance to the Springside District — Brunswick singles player Julianna Ulm also fell one victory short after losing 6-2, 6-1 to Strongsville's Mallory Koch in the quarters — but Bresler and Alber left knowing they had absolutely nothing to hang their heads about. "It was super fun, especially the first day after winning," the left-handed Alber said. "It was just a great experience." Good friends and second doubles players in the regular season, Bresler and Alber were supposed to lose their first match Wednesday to Avon's third-seeded Samantha Jackson and Samantha Gault, but they didn't care about that. Even after dropping the first set decisively, the Bees believed and rallied for a thrilling 1-6, 7-6 (4), 10-4 victory. "Once we lost the first set, we came back," Alber said. "We just turned it around. We knew they would get in their heads if we did. Once we came back, they cracked and we put it away." Bresler and Alber did the same thing in their second match, downing Brecksville's favored Janet Haynes and Carly Mroczka 3-6, 6-1, 10-8 to reach the quarterfinals, where full third sets are played instead of a 10-point tiebreaker. "We like to play under pressure," Bresler said. "Everyone is going, 'Oh, no, they're losing,' but then we come back." The Bees nearly made it 3-for-3 against Strongsville's unseeded Gyure and Rood, who won the Greater Cleveland Conference first doubles championship as the Mustangs captured the league crown. Gyure and Rood downed Medina's first doubles team of Veronika Janciova and Chase Kremer 1-6, 6-2, 6-3 in the regular season, so Bresler and Alber knew they were underdogs again, but again they didn't care. "We went in knowing they could be the better team, but based off our matches the previous day, we knew we had it in us," Alber said. That remained true even when the Bees didn't win a game in the first set. "We weren't worried about it," Bresler said. "In the second set we said, 'We're OK. We've just got to play.' We play well under pressure. It's not stressful for us." Behind some powerful flat serves from the right-handed Bresler, who was playing with rotator cuff tendinitis and a stinger in her right shoulder, plus some great putaways at the net by Alber, the Bees never trailed in the second set. When Bresler held serve to start the third set, Medina appeared to have the momentum, but some forehand errors and better play by Gyure and Rood put the Mustangs up 3-1 and then 4-2. Alber then held serve to make it 4-3 and the Bees got a service break to tie the set, but Strongsville won the final two games to advance. "I'm always positive throughout the whole match," Bresler said. "I always have fun playing with Nellie. Yesterday in our last match I even turned to her and told her how much fun I was having." Ulm, Brunswick's first singles player in the regular season, also was upbeat after her loss to Strongsville's Koch, who beat her 6-0, 6-2 in the regular season. Koch was the GCC first singles champion, beating Shaker Heights' Ameya Bole in the final. Bole won the Solon D-I Sectional singles title Wednesday. "I was just trying to stay confident," said Ulm, a sophomore. "I was going to stay humble throughout the match and humble if I won or lost." Like Bresler and Alber, Ulm won two earlier matches to reach the quarterfinals, including a 7-6, 7-6 victory over Medina's M.J. Pimpo in her second outing. "I feel good," she said. "I played the best I could in each one of my matches." Contact Rick Noland at (330) 721-4046 or rnoland@medina-gazette.com. Follow him @RickNoland on X.