MOSES LAKE — Moses Lake Mavericks’ Abbie O’Neil and Claire Thompson won first place in the consolation bracket over the weekend at the annual Inland Empire tournament in Spokane. 

“It was definitely like a roller coaster of locked in slash locked out, happy slash angry,” said O’Neil. 

Mavs coach Jay Dickinson said this is the biggest tournament in the U.S. at the high school level, with 56 teams being represented at the tournament. They had players spread across 13 sites around Spokane for singles, doubles and mixed doubles matches,s where it was essentially single elimination before going into the consolation bracket.  

Day one of the tournament placed O’Neil and Thompson’s first match against Ellensburg, where they won the first set 6-4 but lost the second set 5-7 and the tiebreaker 9-11. 

“I think the first match is usually hard with a tournament,” said Thompson. “We made it to the third set but lost that one, so that put us into the consolation bracket.” 

The girls went on to win three in a row against Newport, Chiawana and Kennewick to move them on to the second day of the tournament. Day two had them face Toppenish, where they lost the first set 2-6, won the second set 7-5 and came out on top of the tiebreaker set 10-6. 

In their final match against Lakesid,e they put up a 6-3 victory in the first set but got a little too confident in the second, where they lost 2-,6 which brought them into a tiebreak set, they said. At this point in the tournament, their teammates had already finished their matches and came to cheer on the girls in their final set. 

“It was so close,” said O’Neil. “It kept fluctuating who was up, who was down, but we pulled through.” 

The girls went on to win that final set 11-9, earning them first place in the consolation bracket. 

“I think having the rest of our team there the second day was a lot better as the first day we had like one of each of our parents and that was about it,” said Thompson. “The second day, a lot more people were there to support, which was better.” 

The two said their ability to communicate and work together gave them strength as a doubles team at the tournament. Thompson said their differences in personality on the court help them complement one another in their play style. 

“She gets me out of my head most of the time and we’ve figured out a lot of strategies together,” said Thompson. 

These girls had also made it into the second day of the tournament in 2024, but this year pushed themselves even farther, showing how much they’ve improved since their last appearance, said O’Neil. 

The Mavs tennis team overall finished 16th at the tournament despite not having enough players to fill the first and second girls' singles brackets. They also had almost every one of their teams win at least one match while out at the tournament, said Dickinson. 

“I was pretty proud of the showing and really it was a good team event,” said the coach. “We showed a lot of camaraderie in our team as well in the support for each other.” 

O’Neil said that this tournament was great for preparing them to move toward their future matches, as they had to play hard and win five straight matches to avoid elimination. 

“Playing six matches gives you so much practice for future matches,” said O’Neil. 

“Even if you’re down, you can always get back up,” said Thompson. “I think that’s pretty helpful, even if we play singles along the way.” 

The Mavs are preparing for a busy week as they faced Wenatchee High School yesterday and will be on the road tomorrow and Saturday to face West Valley and Sunnyside. The results of the Wenatchee matches were not available at the time of publication. 

The girls said they wanted to thank their coaches, Dickinson and Mark Thompson, for all the support that they’ve given the team this year, along with Becca Madsen, who got the players hotels for the tournament and other parents who have been able to support the team this season. 

Mavericks tennis teams play their next matches on the road to face West Valley at 3 p.m. Wednesday 

    Emitt Madsen and Elise Miles made up the Mavs’ first mixed doubles team.
  

    The Mavs’ second mixed doubles team was Kalei Bruce and Colin Stanberry.
  

    Kamaile Bruce and Selah Loomis, seen on a changeover were one of the Mavs’ other girl doubles teams.