BCHS' Lyndsay Cooke honored as All-Area Tennis Singles Player of Year
| Wednesday, Dec 24 2008 11:39 PM
Last Updated Friday, Mar 27 2009 01:49 PM
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Lyndsay Cooke
Lyndsay Cooke is in pretty special company as a tennis player, according to Frank Thiessen, her coach at Bakersfield Christian High School.
"If you go all the way back, she's probably in the top three or four," Thiessen said of the players he's seen in his 49 years of coaching tennis.
He rattled off names such as Gloria Friedman, Heidi Steiber, Alyce and Marianne Werdel, Camille Benjamin -- players who excelled on the professional and/or college level after leaving Bakersfield youth tennis.
"She's right in there; as good as any of those," Thiessen said. "She's a Division I player. That's the best way to describe her."
Cooke, a junior at BCHS, went 30-1 this season and finished as the runner-up in the CIF Central Section Individual Tennis Championships. She has been named The Californian'sGirls Tennis All-Area Player of the Year.
Cooke also helped BCHS to an undefeated dual meet season and the section's Division V champion. Included was a Lewis Cup win over Stockdale, the Division I team champion.
For Cooke, she isn't even sure tennis is her favorite sport.
Unlike most top-level players who concentrate only on tennis, Cooke is a busy soccer player who competes not only for the Eagles but on a traveling club team.
"I love them both," said Cooke, 16. "They have very different dynamics. Tennis is more focused on the individual. In soccer, you depend a lot on your team."
Cooke said she hopes she's a good enough player in one sport or the other -- if not both -- to receive scholarship offers from colleges.
"If I get a scholarship offer in one of them, it would force me to choose," she said. "I don't think I could give up one of them."
Top-level tennis players often begin at very young ages, sometimes as soon as they can hold a racket. Cooke didn't start playing tennis until her family moved to Bakersfield nine years ago when her father, Jamie, signed a contract to play hockey with the Condors.
A bonus this season for Cooke: her freshman sister, Chelby, joined the team. Chelby Cooke also went 30-1.
"Having my little sister on the team was great," Lyndsay said. "We never played on the same team before."
Chelby also helped Lyndsay's game because they spent many practices working out together.
The sisters' skill level was much higher than many opponents they faced. Lyndsay said she had methods that were effective in keeping her sharp instead of playing down to the competition.
"I usually set goals for myself," she said. "How many points I'll lose. Can I ace them every time? And my sister helped. When I play with her, I can be serious."
Thiessen said Lyndsay lost only 14 games all season. She was undefeated until the section finals, when Visalia-Redwood junior Gabrielle Gatewood beat her 6-0, 6-3. It was the second straight year Gatewood beat Cooke in the section finals.
Gatewood also handed Chelby her only loss of the season in the semifinals.
"I would have liked to have done better in that match, especially the first match," Lyndsay said.
"Sometimes you feel like you're really on. I did not have that great of a day. She came out playing really well. She played my sister before, which warmed her up. I would have liked to have gone out better. But at the same time, I was glad the season was over. I'd done well to that point. I was proud of the team's accomplishments, and happy for my season."
The All-Area Doubles Team of the Year was Stockdale's Frances Ellison and Julie Hutton, who won the Central Section doubles championship despite rarely teaming up in the regular season.
"They played doubles together about six times during the regular season," said Stockdale coach Dave Hillestad. "My idea was to find out who they played good doubles with, so when we played in the Valley (section playoffs), both would make excellent doubles teams no matter who they were with."
Ellison and Hutton, both seniors, won the section title with a 6-3, 7-5 win over Allison Gobel and Irene Rios of Clovis-Buchanan. Ellison and Hutton pulled out the match by winning the final four points in the second set. That concluded a 10-0 season.
