The Lady Eagles protected the home courts of Los Altos High today in the second round of CCS, winning handedly against the Carmel High School Padres despite an unfamiliar tournament format. The team won by a landslide, building the team’s momentum for its matchup on Friday, November 9, against number one seed Monta Vista High School.

“I personally think it was the best our team has ever played,” Co-captain senior Katie Kouvelas said. “Our coach is very proud.”

The team persevered despite a CCS-specific tournament format, where each player (or doubles team) plays against all the other players in the tournament, which prevents a controversial strategy known as “stacking.” Normal matches involve a best of 3 format, where the best ranked player of one team plays the best ranked player of the other, the second best plays the second best, and so on.

“I think the CCS style of match playing put us at an advantage today.” Katie said. “Because each set is played individually, each game is important. It’s more of an incentive to play as hard as you can because each point matters.”

The eighth-seeded Los Altos squad hopes that this decisive victory will set the tone for the tournament, but it will face an even more difficult challenge against Monta Vista.

“It’s going to be a difficult match to pull off but we want to make them work for it,” Katie said.

[Photos by Ciera Pasturel]