Linden-Kildare tennis has successful campaign

The Linden-Kildare Tennis team had a very successful campaign in 2021.

After COVID-19 cancelled tennis a year ago, the players were determined to make the most of this season.

Season

During the season, the team competed in several invitational tournaments.

At the Hughes Springs Slam Tournament Leah Brown finished third and Cambree Kerr was fourth in girls’ singles.

In the same tournament, Chase Bynum and Christopher Palmer finished in first place in boys’ doubles. At the Hughes Springs Classic Tournament Kendall Wells finished second in girls’ singles, and Chase Bynum and Christopher Palmer finished in first place in boys’ doubles.

District

At the district tournament, the girls’ team won the district team championship.

The boys’ team finished as team co-champions with McLeod. This was the third consecutive year for both the boys and the girls to win the district team titles.

The first and second place finishers at the district tournament qualified for the regional tournament.

Girls’ singles qualifiers were Kendall Wells, first place and Leah Brown, second place, and girls’ doubles qualifiers were Linzy Callaway and Rylee Burns, third place.

Boys’ singles qualifier was Tashawn Patterson, third place, mixed doubles qualifiers were Mason Johnson and Cambree Kerr, first place, and boys’ doubles qualifiers were Chase Bynum and Christopher Palmer, first place, and Cade Bynum and Vincent Peters third place.

Regionals

The UIL 2A Region II Tennis Tournament was held at the Richland Tennis Center in Richland Hills, Texas. The kids played some of their best tennis of the season against some very tough competition.

Girls’ singles regional qualifier was Kendall Wells and Leah Brown was a girls’ singles regional quarterfinalist.

Mason Johnson and Cambree Kerr were regional quarterfinalists in mixed doubles, and

Chase Bynum and Christopher Palmer were crowned regional champions in boy’s doubles. By winning the regional championship, Bynum

By winning the regional championship, Bynum and Palmer qualified for the UIL State Tournament that was held in San Antonio May 20-21.

State

In the first round, they drew a team from Mason, Texas. In the first set, the duo started a little flat but towards the end of that set their game started to improve.

In the second set, they cleaned up their game and played point for point with a very good team.

In the second set tiebreak, they lost 5-7, which made the final match score 2-6, 6-7 (5).

These two played hard and battled until the last point. The team that beat them went on to finish as the state runner-up. This was only the second time in school history that L-K was represented at the state tennis tournament. In 2019, Bynum and a different partner (Ty Patterson) qualified for the state tournament.

L-K team members this season were, Chase Bynum, Cade Bynum, Colby Gibson, Mason Johnson, Christopher Palmer, Tashawn Patterson, Vincent Peters, Leah Brown, Rylee Burns, Linzy Callaway, Cambree Kerr and Kendall Wells.