Evanston finds place in top 10 Program on rise, but still has ways to go to join elite

Evanston's on a roll. The Wildkits just missed making the ChicagoSun-Times preseason top 10, but moved in at No. 9 after winning theSchaumburg Invitational last Saturday.

"I'm not so sure we're that good yet," coach Shirley Nannini said."There's a lot more room between us and the not-so-strong programsthan there is between us and the elite programs. We are improvingevery meet and starting to look good."

The Wildkits (5-2) are led by doubles players Nicole Brown andHannah Thomas and Katie Spehar and Hannah Kauffman. The top singlesplayers are Whitney Lappley and Charlotte Mason.

Evanston's defeats were against top-ranked Andrew and No. 7Wheaton South.

"Those are the losses that tell me we have a long way to go,"Nannini said. "I'll tell you, Andrew is going to win the statechampionship. Andrew really beat us bad and Wheaton beat us 12-3.That's what tells me we have a long way to go.

"There is also a big difference between a team that can win a biginvitational and win the state meet. You can enter two doubles teamsand two singles players for state and it's your top two teams in boththat tell the top teams. Invitationals tell you who has the bestprogram that year.

"We'll see how we improve before (New Trier) Featherfest and ourown tournament.

"But this team still has some convincing to do before I thinkwe're one of the top teams."

Better than advertised

Among those surprised by Andrew's play in the early part of theseason is coach Terry Ter Haar. The Thunderbolts are undefeated andwon the Palatine Championship. They've won easily except for a tight9-6 win over No. 4 Downers Grove North on March 14.

"That was early," Ter Haar said. "I've been noticing that they areplaying a lot of different people at different positions so I don'tknow what to make of that (win) yet. But I have been a littlesurprised with how we are doing and dominating some teams."

Andrew is 7-0 after winning at Palatine and teams have had troublegetting a single point.

"I still feel we are learning at singles but we are doing betterthan I thought so that's a credit to the girls," Ter Haar said. "Wewill see after our ACT break. The big invitationals are coming up andthat will tell me a lot about where we stand with the other topplayers."

Top singles players

Erin Hois of Downers Grove South and Yvonne Cheng of NapervilleNorth are the class of the singles players, but others have hadsuccessful tournaments. Taryn Dennison of DeKalb defeated Cara Greggof Riverside-Brookfield to win the Glenbard East Invitational andAmber Whittrock of Bradley won at Hersey March 25. Carissa Nieman ofHinsdale South defeated teammate Kylie Canaday to win the Hornetsinvitational March 17.