Sophomore Rylie Wilkison has been the team’s No. 1 singles player since the start of her high school career.
Daily Journal file photo
The one-step-at-a-time mindset coaches have spent generations trying to get their athletes to adopt is being followed to the letter by one county team.
Franklin girls tennis isn’t about to change anytime soon.
The Grizzly Cubs are out of the gate fast this spring with seven consecutive victories — all by 5-0 final scores — and a gradual ascent to a No. 12 state ranking in the latest coaches’ poll.
Impressive happenings for a team that includes just one senior.
“Honestly, we’ve been working very hard in the offseason, and it’s paying off,” said sophomore Rylie Wilkison, the Cubs’ No. 1 singles player for a second consecutive year after going 17-6 last season and being named second team all-state.
“I’ve been practicing a lot more, and am more serious about every match. I’ve just realized that I can win a lot more, but I’m more focused on team goals.”
There was a time the Johnson County tournament would have been Franklin’s first opportunity to showcase itself, but that event no longer exists.
However, the Cubs have already beaten perennial county power Center Grove and aspire to secure a Mid-State Conference championship. Franklin has claimed at least a share of the league title in each of the last four seasons and can finish off a perfect conference run again this spring by beating Decatur Central today and Whiteland on Wednesday.
The Mid-State tournament, which is being contested Monday and Tuesday at Plainfield, has no bearing on the team standings, but the Grizzly Cubs figure to have a shot at most, if not all, of the individual singles and doubles crowns.
Franklin is also zeroed in on winning its first sectional since 2009, which would mean having to finally snap Center Grove’s long-standing monopoly on team regional appearances. The Grizzly Cubs blanked the Trojans, 5-0, on April 19.
Aside from Wilkison, the starting lineup consists of sophomore Chelsie Rayl at the second singles spot and junior Emma Williams at No. 3.
The lone senior, Haley Haldeman, teams with junior Ailyn Hendricks at No. 1 doubles; the second doubles combo is usually either sophs Kennedy Urban and Emma Sappenfield or Kate Pinnick and Meleah Murphy.
Athletic specialization isn’t part of Franklin’s success. If anything, said longtime coach Rusty Hughes, the opposite is true.
“I knew we would be pretty good. We were very optimistic, but we haven’t done anything yet,” Hughes said. “Our kids are pretty level-headed. We’ve probably got three or four athletes whose main sport isn’t tennis.”
Seven of Franklin’s top nine players play two or more sports.
Wilkison plays golf in the fall, while Urban, Haldeman and Pinnick are part of the volleyball team and Rayl plays soccer. Urban and Sappenfield were on the girls basketball roster this winter as the Grizzly Cubs finished 28-2 and were state runners-up in Class 4A.
“I think it’s great,” Hughes said. “I love coaching athletes who know how to compete. In the heat of competition, they don’t back down.”
The coach feels playing competitive tennis is a great life lesson in that players must be physically fit, competitive — and, perhaps most importantly, fair with the opponent when it comes to calling whether a ball is in or out.
The Grizzly Cubs’ opponents have taken notice.
“Franklin is, up and down the lineup, the best team we’ve competed against this season,” Plainfield coach Keith Bradley said. “They’re young and they just keep getting better.”
