Erin Flynn of Hancock, a senior at John Bapst of Bangor, capped off her high school tennis career with a second-place finish in the girls singles division of the New England High School Tennis Championships at West Hartford, Conn.

Flynn, who reached the semifinals of this year’s Maine high school singles tournament, defeated Madison Hartley of Rice Memorial High School of South Burlington, Vt., 6-1, 6-1 in the semifinals.

She then lost the championship match 6-1, 6-4 to Vanessa Petrini, a sophomore from Westhill High School in Stamford, Conn., the reigning Connecticut state open individual champion.

Flynn was bidding to earn Maine the New England title in girls singles play for the fourth straight year. Camille Jania of Scarborough, the 2005 and 2008 state champion, won the regional title in 2005.

Christine Ordway of Waynflete of Portland, who ousted Flynn in this year’s state singles semifinals, won the state and New England championships in both 2006 and 2007.

Flynn, who plans to continue her tennis career in college and has been accepted at Columbia University, qualified for Maine’s state singles tournament in each of her four years at John Bapst. She reached the Round of 16 as a freshman and the quarterfinals as a sophomore and junior before reaching the semifinals this year.

Four wrestlers honored

Carlin Dubay of Caribou and Jerod Rideout of Foxcroft Academy are among four senior wrestlers from Maine recognized as honorable mention All-Americans by Wrestling USA magazine.

Dubay went 54-0 last winter, winning his third consecutive Class B state championship at 103 pounds before capping off his season by winning the New England championship in his weight class.

Dubay also went undefeated against in-state competition throughout his final three years of high school wrestling.

Rideout became a four-time state champion for the Ponies last season, winning the Class C state title at 160 pounds while leading Foxcroft Academy to the Eastern Maine championship.

Dubay and Rideout are joined as Wrestling USA honorable mention All-Americans by Chris Smith, a four-time state champion from Deering of Portland and fourth in New England at 119 pounds in 2008, and Jon Smith, a three-time state champ and 2008 New England runnerup at 145 pounds from Dirigo of Dixfield.

Friendship series Nebraska bound

Travis Spencer of Belfast and Cinjin Goewey of Maine Central Institute of Pittsfield are among 17 high school wrestlers who will represent the state at the 24th Maine-Nebraska Friendship Wrestling Exchange to be held this year in the Cornhusker State June 22-29.

Spencer is a three-time Class B individual state champion – the last two years at 189 pounds – and high school All-American who helped Belfast win the Class B state team title last winter.

Goewey finished his career with a school record 111 wins, and also won the Class B individual state championship at 135 pounds.

They are joined on the Maine team by D.J. Brackett, Logan Russell and Spencer Chipman, all of Morse of Bath; Jake Longley, Mark Richardson, Steven Desrochers and Peter Bronder, all of Noble of North Berwick; Ray Gauthier and Nick Mecurio of York, Shane Daly of Wells, Matt DelGallo of Gardiner, Chris Smith of Deering of Portland, Sam Webber of Mt. Blue of Farmington, and Marshall Gleason of Concord (N.H.).

Coaches are Bryan Thompson of York, Terry Devereaux of Erskine Academy of South China and Shawn Guest of Morse.

The team will wrestle at four different Nebraska locations: June 22-23 at Kearney, June 24-25 at Columbus, June 26-27 at Lincoln and June 28-29 at Auburn.

A boost for the Vikings

One major question facing the Caribou boys tennis team in the days leading up to its Class B state championship match was whether the Vikings had played a strong enough schedule to be prepared to face a tournament-tested Falmouth squad.

If there were any questions about that issue in the Caribou camp, it was resolved the day before the final.

The Vikings arrived in Lewiston, host city for the state finals, on Friday afternoon, where coach John Habeeb had lined up a scrimmage against five-time defending Class A state champion Lewiston High School at the Wallach Tennis Complex on the campus of Bates College.

Caribou fared well in the matchup, reportedly winning three of the four pro sets that were completed.

“It was a huge confidence boost,” said Vikings’ third singles player Casey Lancaster. “Lewiston had beat Falmouth in a scrimmage, and when we went out and beat Lewiston 3-1 because second singles didn’t finish, it was just a huge confidence booster for our team and we knew we had a good chance.”

The site of the scrimmage also was important, for it allowed the Vikings to become more familiar with the site of the state championship match the next afternoon.

“It helped a lot, especially for the doubles players because they had never played on these courts before,” said top seed Franz Zehentner, who along with Lancaster and second singles player Shane Belanger had played at Bates College during the state singles tournament.

Caribou took the newfound confidence it gained from practicing with Lewiston and applied it to its performance against Falmouth, which ended with the Vikings sweeping the Yachtsmen 5-0 to claim their first state championship.

“That was awesome preparation,” said doubles player Keegan Wakana. “They’re a pretty high-caliber team, so playing well against them really helped us.”

Reinforcements, anyone

After reaching the Eastern Maine final in 2007 and winning its first regional title this year, the Madawaska girls tennis program should be in good shape.

While three seniors will graduate from this year’s starting lineup, junior Cindy Lagasse and sophomores Audrey Bergeron, Denyse Guerrette and Jenna Parent will return, and 2007 top seed Susan Lavertu also could come back after sitting out this season with mononucleosis.

Seems like a good foundation for another strong run in 2009 – except those are the only players in the high school program at present, and it takes a minimum of seven players to make up a varsity squad.

“I’ve got to go fish some players out,” said Madawaska coach Dean Gendreau.

“This year we had seven, last year we had eight. There are some girls who are interested, some middle school girls coming up and a few girls in high school who might start playing and realize it’s not that bad, it’s a fun sport, and if they have friends who are playing that might help, too.”

eclark@bangordailynews.net

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