On the day of the individual finals, the seven players who advanced to the semis and I warmed up very nicely at the Azusa HS gym. In retrospect, the good warm-up amongst the eight of us foreshadowed the success to come later that afternoon. Tony and Elida lost two competitive mixed doubles games to finish fourth in league. Kalene also finished fourth in girls singles while Melissa finished with a bronze medal. Tony also earned a bronze medal in boys singles. It was obvious that he was playing through pain and was not telling anyone about it. Jocelyn and Elida came back from a set down to capture bronzes in girls doubles. Alexis and Sam won bronze medals in the boys doubles.
Two of the most exciting matches of the day were the wins by Alexis and Melissa in mixed doubles. In the semis, they beat out the number one ranked team 11-5 and 13-12 in a roller coaster second set. Despite going through one of the toughest losses in her young career in the girls singles semis, Melissa played extremely well in the mixed doubles finale. Her serves were near perfection throughout the entire match, which went to the third set. In one sequence, she was actually pinned to the back of the court, the number two ranked team cleared to her and Melissa smashed down the middle of the court with authority to put the point away. Alexis played beautiful badminton throughout the whole match. I was extremely proud that our players played and won with class and respected our opponents and the game.
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