St. Joseph鈥檚 Academy coach Jonathan Howard liked his team鈥檚 chances before the LHSAA state tennis tournament.
As he headed home from Monroe with a championship trophy in tow, the first-year coach liked the results even better.
Led by singles champion Ella Mancuso and the first-place doubles team of Laura Caroline Holliday and Cameron Raines, the Redstickers scored 17陆 points to run away with the Division I girls title on Friday at UL-Monroe.
鈥淲e dominated and did some really impressive things,鈥 Howard said. 鈥淚 am so proud of this team and the things they have done.
鈥淏ut it did not go exactly the way I thought it would. Going in, I thought it be us and Mount Carmel. As it turned out, it was us and Barbe.鈥
And the team result was not close. Barbe was second with eight points.
The Division I boys competition was much closer with Brother Martin edging Jesuit 12陆 to 11陆. Catholic High placed third at 12陆.
SJA鈥檚 Mancuso beat Natalie Devraj of Mandeville 6-4, 6-4 in the singles final, avenging championship losses to Devraj the past two seasons.
On the doubles side, it was an all SJA story. Holliday and Raines beat teammates Adeline Hedges and Marie Sereda 6-4, 6-3.
Catholic claimed the Division I boys doubles title. The Bears鈥 Charles DuBos and Christian St. Martin beat Brother Martin鈥檚 Reed MacAlester and Sal Trujillo 6-1, 7-6.