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Gens, Fredonia Top Jamestown In Regular-Season Finale

FREDONIA — Bernie Gens celebrated the final regular-season Chautauqua-Cattaraugus Athletic Association match of her career in typical fashion Wednesday, picking up a 10-4 win over Jamestown’s CeCe Eklum to lead Fredonia to a 3-2 victory.

The win lifted the Hillbillies to a 4-1 record on the year, and served as yet another reminder of how dominant Gens has been over the course of the last four years.

In six years of varsity tennis, Gens boasts a record of 46 wins and nine losses, aiding Fredonia to a 30-1 team record in the last four seasons.

“She just played her last (regular season) game today. She’s had an awesome career,” Fredonia coach Lisa Johnston said. “She started out as the youngest one, with all of these players she was looking up to. Now she is the one that other players are looking up to.”

Gens first picked up a racquet at age 3, making her way onto Fredonia’s varsity team before she was a teenager.

“She was just this little girl, even though she was so young, she had developed a really good tennis game early,” Johnston recalled. “She’s just so very consistent and has a game that can frustrate opponents. Over the last four year’s she’s won almost every match 6-0, 6-0 or 6-1, 6-1. She somehow manages to not lose many games.”

Gens no doubt would have like the opportunity to compete for a chance to play at the New York State Public High School Athletic Association Championships in Flushing this year, but has been denied that opportunity due to COVID-19.

Today, she will join the CCAA’s best at the Lakewood Family YMCA and hope to defend her county crown for the third consecutive year. This weekend’s winners will earn a chance to play for a Section VI crown at Miller Tennis Center in Williamsville on Friday, Oct. 23.

Bernie Gens (F) d. CeCe Eklum, 10-4. Madison Smith (J) d. Victoria Miller, 10-8. Maddy Marsh (F) d. Mia Brown, 10-6. Ella Smith and Brittney Beardsley (J) d. Sarah Davis and Erin Schrantz, 11-9. Mia Gullo and Tess Corell (F) d. Rena Huntington and Nicole McGrath, 10-1.

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