PAWTUCKET — A man leaving the back courts at Slater Park stopped to watch a few points of the first set of the RIIL Girls State Singles Championships on Sunday. He motioned to the girls with him to come over and watch some of the match.
His eyes widened as South Kingstown’s Alexa Clark ripped serves, crushed forehands and hit soft volleys. After her backhand winner closed out the fourth game, he said something in Spanish to the girls with him before the three walked away.
Excellence needs no translation and at this point, Clark’s game is beyond words anyway. The South Kingstown junior came into the season as the hands-down favorite to repeat as state champ, handled the pressure and continued to better her game. Sunday’s final was an exhibition in greatness and Clark’s 6-1, 6-1 win over La Salle’s Bianca Presciutti made her the first back-to-back champion in South Kingstown history and first in Rhode Island since 2015.
“I feel like there was a little more pressure this year defending my title rather than gaining it the first time,” said Clark, after the 48-minute match. “I feel good. I feel accomplished and I feel I’ve worked hard for this.”
While Clark was making history on Court 1, La Salle’s Moira Haxton and Alessandro Roye were doing the same two courts over. The Rams’ No. 2 doubles team was excited just to reach Sunday’s final but they outdid their wildest dreams. The two handled the pressure well and completed a 6-3, 7-5 win over Barrington’s Addison Friedman and Jasmine Malik to become what is believed to be the first No. 2 team to claim the RIIL Doubles Championship.
“Somebody said historic,” Roye said. “I’m like ‘Oh, that’s what we’re doing?’ ”
“Anything can happen and, if you work hard, you can get it,” Haxton said. “We never really expected it.”
Clark’s title was.
Her junior season started with a mild speedbump in a 6-4, 7-6 (2) win over East Greenwich’s Ellie Coker-Doman. Since that match, Clark has lost just 26 games, including the nine she dropped in her five matches won in the state singles tourney.
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Despite the results, Clark is confirmed to still be human. She feels nerves leading into every match, but the second she starts warming up with an opponent they’re gone and Clark’s worry — if you can call it that — is on her own side of the net.
“I just feel like it’s more mental,” Clark said. “Of course I go out here and play but I’m kind of fighting with my mind. I know I can do it physically, but it’s more mental.”
Early in Sunday’s match, she struggled with first serves. She missed six of her first seven serves and while she won the game, she also made a mental note to make an adjustment.
In fact, any miscue comes with immediate correction. She’s striving for perfection, something she knows is unattainable, but the chase is half the fun.
“Why should I hold myself to a low standard?” Clark said. “I have high standards for myself and I feel like that just makes me play better and makes me focus more.”
Presciutti threw everything she had at Clark. A self-described “scrappy” player, Presciutti ripped low, flat backhands, big high moonballs and even threw in an underhand serve that landed for an ace and drew a smile from Clark.
“The mindset just going into it is that you’re going to play the best tennis you can today,” Presciutti said. “It’s nothing against you. She’s a great player so you just have to go out and play your best and whatever happens, happens.”
Clark had answers for everything Presciutti offered. She dropped the first point of the match, then won the game. On her first service game, Clark fell down 0-40 before winning it with a forehand winner on deuce point.
There wasn’t one shot better than another. It was sustained greatness for 48 minutes and on match point, Clark got Presciutti off-balance with a big first-serve, then clinched the title by ripping a forehand to the backhand corner that went unchallenged.
Clark didn’t scream, raise her arms in joy or do anything close to celebrating. Her standards, as she said, are different.
“It kind of shows me how much I worked, hard enough to get this point,” Clark said. “I won last year, I won this year and it makes me feel accomplished, like I’ve worked for something.”
While she left Slater in defeat, Presciutti had a similar feeling.
The senior was an All-Stater as sophomore, but injured her shoulder pursuing her other sport — she’s a javelin thrower — and surgery cost Presciutti her junior season. She fought to get to Slater Park on Sunday, fought during the match and left knowing she accomplished something huge.
“I remember just doing PT and everything and I would say to my mom if I could just get back on the court I would be happy and that’s what I did,” Presciutti said. “I’m just happy I could get this far.”
Haxton and Roye arrived at Slater with that mindset. Doubles championship matches are generally reserved for two No. 1 teams with a No. 2 team getting there on occasion to play their teammates.
The semifinals set up that type of opportunity with top teams from Barrington and La Salle playing on the top half of the bracket and the teams’ No. 2 pairings playing on the bottom half.
Haxton and Roye got the job done with a 6-3, 6-3 win and went to teammates Ava Paletta and Giuliana Santoro for advice on how to handle Friedman and Malik.
It was simple. Play your game. So that’s what they did.
The pressure of the situation was immense, but the La Salle duo played relatively stress-free. They treated the match like they would any other regular-season battle, even though there was significantly more on the line.
Both teams held serve over the first five games, but Haxton and Roye broke through at the end of the first set, winning three of the final four to grab the 6-3 win.
“After the first set, there was a bit of confidence. But your confidence can start to wane a little bit,” Roye said. “We both knew we could always pull off a win. We just had to dig deep to find out what worked and what didn’t work.”
The back-and-forth battle continued in the second set, but the Rams were playing like they belonged. The teams traded games and were tied 5-5 before Haxton and Roye finished off the final two. On championship point, Haxton hit a forehand cross-court to the backhand corner that went unreturned and when it landed out, Roye turned and ran to her partner saying “we got it.”
“It feels good,” Haxton said. “After al of that you’re nervous, but after you’re finished you feel so good about it.”
This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: SK’s Alexa Clark cruises to another state singles title
