By Emily Zentner 

Paradise Valley High School’s girl’s tennis team defeated Tempe 9-1 Wednesday.

Paradise Valley won all six of its doubles sets and two of its three singles sets. Its only loss came to Tempe High’s third ranked player, Jasmin Legarde.

“The girls were very focused, and they’re very competitive,” Paradise Valley coach Jim Libretti said.

The team has won three of its five matches so far this season, with eight to go. No. 1 ranked player Jamie Bornscheuer said this has been a very good season so far and credited Paradise Valley’s move from Division II to III for the success.

“We’re playing with people who are more at our speed,” Bornscheuer said.

This season is Libretti’s first ever coaching tennis.

He also serves as Paradise Valley’s freshman football coach but took on the tennis team this year after a series of coaching changes last season.

Last season, the team had three different coaches at different times. Bornscheuer said that this caused a lot of disunity, as the coaches all had very contrasting coaching styles.

“Changing coaches ruins the team’s continuity,” Libretti said. “It’s good that they’ll have the same, solid coach the whole year this season.”

Libretti said he took on the job out of necessity, and had to turn to YouTube to teach himself to play. Being from Brooklyn, playing tennis wasn’t a common pastime in his neighborhood growing up.

“If you were walking around with a tennis racket, you were up to no good,” Libretti said.

Despite the loss, Tempe High coach Darlene Periconi said that she considers the match a success so long as she sees her players making an improvement.

“Whenever we have to play better teams like Paradise Valley, it’s okay to lose,” Periconi said. “I just want to see them using the skills we learned that week in practice.”

Periconi said that her players are learning to compete and that it was hard to get a player to accept the role of the No. 1 ranked player.

The job ultimately fell to Rosaura Carrillo-Garcia, a senior, who lost both her singles and doubles matches to Paradise Valley.

The rankings determine which players they will face off against.

“I try to encourage them to accept the higher ranks because playing better players makes you better,” Periconi said.

So far, Tempe High School is 1-4 this season.

But there are still nine more matches to go. While Paradise Valley’s players were excited about the win, what they were even more excited about was the Hummer limousine the school rented for them instead of a school bus. According to Bornscheuer, this is a common practice for the school when other teams are using the school bus.

“That’s what you get when you live in Paradise Valley,” Periconi said.

Emily Zentner is a journalism student at Arizona State University. 

Twiter: @emilymzentner