SOUTHERN SECTION DIVISION III TENNIS : Los Alamitos Is Close, but Fails to Repeat

It wasn’t difficult to figure out how the Los Alamitos girls’ tennis team fared Tuesday in its Southern Section Division III final match against North Hollywood Harvard-Westlake.

The tears running down the faces of most of the Griffin players told the story.

Winning only two of nine singles matches, Los Alamitos (21-1) fell to Harvard-Westlake, 11-7, at the Claremont Tennis Club.

“I feel so bad right now,” said Susan Huberman, Los Alamitos’ No. 1 singles player, who dropped two of her three matches. “Maybe by tomorrow we’ll feel good about the season.”

What made the loss especially difficult to take for the Griffins was that they came close to winning the match. Harvard-Westlake (21-1) had two 7-5 victories in doubles.

“If those two matches would have went the other way . . . ,” Los Alamitos Coach Debbie Fleming said before her voice trailed off. “We lost to a very, very tough, very solid team.”

Los Alamitos was attempting to successfully defend the title it won a year ago. Harvard-Westlake was moved down a class after winning the Division II title last season.

As the Wolverines gave Coach Brian Maeda the traditional dousing of water, it was apparent they were thrilled about knocking off Los Alamitos.

“I just heard incredible things about Los Alamitos,” Maeda said. “I went into this not knowing what would happen.”