AOTW: Simply dominant: Dieters hope to close prep status with another tennis title
ALL THE RACQUET: Rochester No.1 singles player Kelsey Dieters has posted over 100 career wins and enters this weekend's Division 1 state tournament as the No. 1 seed in her flight for the third straight year. File Photo
BY DAN STICKRADT
SENIOR EDITOR
dan.stickradt@northoaklandsports.com
ROCHESTER HILLS — Last season Kelsey Dieters experienced something at the Division 1 state finals that she hadn’t tasted all season: Defeat.
Dieters, then a junior No. 1 singles star at Rochester, was upset in the state semifinals by Grand Ledge’s Hailey Barrett (1-6, 6-4, 6-4). That was her only defeat of the year and that was coming off an undefeated season her sophomore year, when she also won a state championship.
Dieters, who has played No. 1 singles all four years at Rochester and was named to the Division 1 All-State First Team the past three years, has put together one of the more memorable prep careers in state history.
“Most people don’t know that I was sick last year (at the state finals),” said Dieters, who came down with Kidney Stones. “I don’t want to make excuses.”
Dieters has more than bounced back since her last defeat on the high school circuit. This year she slowly works and wears down opponents to the tune that she’sonly lost a handful of sets the past three seasons.
Holding virtually every school record for a singles player and carrying the tag of being one of the most dominant players ever from this talent-laden region, Dieters is not done yet.
She carried a 103-6 career record into this weekend’s Lower Peninsula Division 1 state finals at Midland Community Tennis Center, and that includes a perfect 25-0 record this year and the No.1 seed in the top singles flight for the third straight season.
“I think (the loss) just made me work harder,” said Dieters. “I don’t think I got too angry. I’m just very competitive. I always go out and try to win and play my best.”
Dieters has always been a highly-touted player, and entered high school with high aspirations. Her freshman year she advanced to the state semifinals.
Since then, she has also climbed the ladder in the Midwest and National rankings by various associations and is now a top-40 ranked player in the U.S. for her age group. Dieters signed last November with Ohio State University of the Big Ten Conference after being recruited by dozens of highly-respected Division I college programs across the country.
Her dad, Bob Dieters, said he saw something at an early age in his daughter and got her involved in dance and tennis.
“I saw she had good hand-eye coordination,” recalled Bob Dieters, a retired school teach and baseball coach at Rochester High. “She excelled at an early age. I liked the idea that she got into an individual sport. I guess it has turned out well. She’s considered the best player in the state.”
Jerry Murphy, who has coached tennis at Rochester High since the 1970s and has been the head girls coach for eight years, said that Dieters is in elite company.
“You don’t find too many kids like her that play No.1 singles all four years and have that type of a record,” he said. “She’s only lost once in the past couple of years. She’s had as good of run as anybody around here in a long, long time, boys or girls.”
In the past decade, Rochester High has almost become a breeding ground for Division I scholarship athletes, as the school has produced more than two dozens of such thoroughbreds. In the past two schools years alone, Rochester has also been blessed with three state athletes of the year, including Christine Meier (Miss Golf 2009), Megan Goethals (Miss Country 2009; Miss Track and Field 2010) and Brook Handler (Miss Cross Country 2010). There have been dozens of all-state and D-I college athletes in that span as well.
“It’s really unbelievable,” said Dieters of the Falcons’ recent lore.
If Dieters wins the No. 1 singles state crown this weekend, she will likely be a shoe-in for Miss Tennis 2011 and join a coveted spot in the same group of her stellar peers.
Her goals are to help Rochester finish in the top 10 in the team standings and to stand atop the medals stand in her final weekend as a prep tennis player. Rochester was 12th last season and Dieters failed to repeat as a state champ.
“I know if I can go out there and play the way I normally do, then I have a great shot,” said Dieters, whose team is also making its fourth straight trip to the state finals. “I have to play my game.”
Her game is simply dominant.
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Category: High School, High School (M-Z), Prep Wraps, Rochester
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