See how Santa Fe Catholic's Nya Kerr won two titles at district girls tennis tournament
LAKELAND — For Santa Fe Catholic junior Nya Kerr, it was two titles for the price of one at the Class 1A, District 6 girls tennis tournament – unofficially, at least.
Kerr, who is in her first year at Santa Fe after moving from Tampa, withdrew from the Polk County finals on Friday to rest a sore shoulder and wrist so she would be ready for the district tournament. On Monday, she defeated her county final opponent, Frostproof's Hannah Windham, then beat Windermere Prep’s Jiaxu Zhang, 6-2, 6-4, on Tuesday morning in the No. 1 singles final at Woodlake Park.
With the victory, Kerr is an automatic qualifier for the state tournament as a district champion at No. 1 singles. The event is scheduled for May 1-3, with individual brackets at Sylvan Lake Park in Sanford.
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Kerr had one hiccup in the final when leading 4-1, she lost back-to-back games, losing the second of those when she double-faulted on consecutive points. She never trailed, however, regrouped, broke Zhang’s serve then closed out the match.
“I just knew if I was going to lose my game (on serve) to just attack her game so I could get hers and we could go back and forth,” Kerr said.
In the first set, she stormed out to a 5-0 lead before dropping back-to-back games.
“I was up 5-0, and we had a close call, so the umpire came and it got a little bit in my head,” Kerr said. “But it was OK because I ended up pulling it through.”
Kerr played No. 1 singles as an eighth-grader at Carrolwood Day in Tampa but did not play high school tennis the past two years as she took online classes. She moved to Lakeland last year and went to Santa Fe Catholic because her stepbrother went there.
The past two years, Kerr just played USTA tennis but joined the high school team this season. She had no idea what to expect.
The No. 1 singles title was up for grabs after Auburndale’s McKenna Battilla sustained an injury in soccer that kept her out of tennis. Kerr emerged with wins over the other top singles players in the county, including McKeel’s Jada Hutto and Windham.
Kerr beat Hutto in the West County tournament. With the county final not being played, when Kerr and Windham met Monday, it served as a rematch. She admitted that she looked at it as sort of the county final.
“A little bit, yeah,” she said. “They were telling me that she was really good, so I went in working as hard as I could and outwork my player, so that’s what I did. And it worked out good.”
This article originally appeared on The Ledger: Santa Fe Catholic's Nya Kerr wins district tennis title, qualifies for state
