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Pusch Ridge seniors treat their beat feet after another featArizona Daily Star
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 05.11.2008
When you are as good and as decorated as Jamie Shepherd and Mya Towne, you get the diva treatment.
The Pusch Ridge Christian seniors put an exclamation point on their high school careers Saturday morning by leading the Lions to a 5-0 win over Florence for the Class 2A/3A team state championship at Phoenix Tennis Center.
Shepherd and Towne finished high school with 12 state championships between them, the result of four years of hard work on their feet.
So the friends celebrated the end appropriately — with a pedicure.
"I was waiting until after the season, because my feet get so gross from wearing tennis shoes all the time," Towne said. "Now, I don't have to."
Pusch Ridge won its second straight team championship, and did so in quick order, dispatching a short-handed Florence team in about 45 minutes.
To its credit, Florence impressively made the state final playing the entire season with only five players, instead of the standard six. That gave Pusch Ridge a 2-0 lead — one default win for singles, one for doubles — right off the bat in the best-of-nine match.
"It was kind of a weird atmosphere, being up 2-0 before the match even started," said Towne, who won the singles state title as a freshman and the doubles crown May 3 with Shepherd.
"We just said, 'Let's get this done in singles and not have to worry about playing doubles.' It didn't feel like we had just won state because it went so quickly."
Towne won her match 6-1, 6-0 in the No. 1 singles slot, while sophomore No. 2 Tanya Hetlinger cruised 6-1, 6-1, and Shepherd won 6-0, 6-2 in the No. 3 match.
Pusch Ridge finished the year 19-0 with its four all-region seniors — Towne, Shepherd, Alyssa Johnson and Laura Seekatz — serving as the backbone.
"Trying to win it the second time was a little more challenging, but this group of seniors has been together for so long that we had an edge," said coach David Towne. "They were very instrumental in building our tennis culture at the school."
Shepherd, who was a four-time state champion with the school's basketball team, will attend Oklahoma Baptist University next year — but will not play sports.
"I realized this is the last time I'm going to play high school sports and tennis for a team, so I wanted to go out in a good way and have fun," she said. "It's kind of surreal to end it with another state championship."
Towne will play tennis next year at Whitworth University in Spokane, Wash.
In the boys 2A/3A final, Phoenix Country Day beat Thatcher 5-0.
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