Duluth East Girls Tennis Headlined by Deep Senior Class

3-3 start to 2023 season

DULUTH, Minn.- The The high school girls tennis season is in full swing, and the courts at Longview will be getting plenty of use from the Duluth East girls, who have already been busy with competitions over the last two weeks.

Entering this week, the Greyhounds have gone 3-and-3 as a team, which includes a 7-0 win over Grand Rapids on Friday. Last year, the Greyhounds were knocked out of the 7AA Sectionals
by top-seeded Elk River in the quarterfinals. Head Coach Lee Kruger believes Elk River will once again be the team to beat, but he’s also confident his girls have what it takes to make a deep run in the tournament.

“I think if we put ourselves in good position winning the section match and getting a high seed, we should be a tough out.” says Coach Kruger. “I keep trying to tell them, it doesn’t matter who wins in August, we just want to be playing our best tennis in late September, early October.”

This year’s Greyhounds team is loaded with experience, particularly their senior class. Coach Kruger estimates that seven seniors are among his team’s 10 best players. Meanwhile, captains Ella Johnson and Isla Pepelnjak are encouraged by East’s early matches, which they hope can catapult them forward through the fall season.

“We definitely are good at working together…We can switch it up and everyone still works well together. It’s nice to have a group of girls that all is pretty talented together.” says Johnson.

“We are winning some matches now earlier in the season, which makes me excited because I feel like that will keep a good momentum throughout the year, and I just hope that we can win some of the tougher matches to get us a good seed for sectionals.” says Pepelnjak, who was one of two Greyhounds in last year’s Class AA Individual State Tournament.

Duluth East will have an active week on the tennis court. On Tuesday, they’ll face both Superior and Duluth Denfeld, followed by a match against White Bear Lake on Thursday.