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Miller Roars to USTA Girls 16 Title : Tennis: Ever since she changed racquets, Midland, Mich., teen has been on a roll.

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TIMES STAFF WRITER

Things weren’t going very well with the Blast in January, so she changed her Approach and it’s been nothing but Win, Win, Win ever since.

“In January, I couldn’t get a ball on the court,” Anne Miller said Saturday afternoon at Morley Field. “So I switched racquets, from a Prince Blast to a Prince Approach, and it’s been working for me.”

That it is. Top-seeded Miller, of Midland, Mich., defeated in-state rival Mashona Washington of Flint, 6-2, 6-1, to win the United States Tennis Assn.’s Girls 16 national championship in 50 minutes, giving Miller her second national title in three weeks. She won the 16s Clay Court nationals July 20 in Virginia.

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Miller acknowledged Saturday’s victory was an extension of the above-par tennis she’s been playing not only all week--she lost just 19 games--but since her change in tennis weapons.

Case in point: She has done no worse than to reach the quarterfinals of three international junior tournaments, lost in the Easter Bowl final to La Jolla’s Ditta Huber, the defending 16s champion who played 18s this year, and almost qualified for the main draw of the Lipton pro tournament in Key Biscayne, Fla.

“I’m kind of on a roll, I guess,” said Miller, whose 16s tournament appearances may well have begun and ended in San Diego. Last year, her 16s debut was here, and she will probably jump to the 18s, as soon as possible.

“I think I’ll play 18s next year, maybe even indoors, which are over Thanksgiving,” she said with a pensive look. Yet Miller, who just turned 14, conceded vast improvements in her game are needed for her to stay competitive with the “big girls.”

“I need to serve much harder and my transition game needs work,” she said. “Like today, she’d pop one up, and instead of taking advantage and going in on it, I’d stay back. I’m not confident in my volleys.”

Saturday she didn’t need them. What she had worked perfectly. Miller and Washington met in the quarterfinals at the clay court tournament, where Washington pressed for a three-set match. But this was truly Miller’s Time.

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“She played well,” said Washington, 15, who had a string of unforced errors and appeared frustrated by her inability to take Miller out of her game. “She kept hitting excellent shots throughout the match.”

Miller doesn’t have one great weapon, and it’s perplexing to watch her win so easily. Her game plan is to simply work the angles to death, get everything back and don’t get flustered.

“It takes three or four shots before you can even win a point off her,” said Washington, who was appearing in her first national final. “The ball just keeps coming back.”

As to why she didn’t take more chances when she was clearly in control of the match, Miller said she chickened out. “I know I should have,” she said. “But I just don’t want to take the chances.”

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