SEATTLE — Even when they were beaten in the first set against the team that defeated them last year in the state 2A finals, Sequim tennis players Jessica Dietzman and Kalli Wiker were confident they were going to win the state championship this year.
In 2018, the doubles’ team of Dietzman and Wiker went up against a very good duo from Sammamish, Nina Vongsaly and Katrina Kuntz. Vongsaly and Kuntz won 6-3, 6-3 and Dietzman and Wiker had to settle for second place at the state 2A tournament.
That’s nothing to be ashamed of, but it wasn’t good enough for Dietzman and Wiker. They tore through the season, not only not losing a match all year, but not even losing a set.
They blew through the Olympic League tournament, the WCD III District tournament, and finally through the state 2A tournament until they faced Vongsaly and Kuntz in the state championship match for a second straight year.
The Sammamish duo won its first set in a tiebreaker against Dietzman and Wiker 7-6. In two state championship matches, the Sequim duo had yet to take a set from Vongsaly and Kuntz. It was also the first set that Dietzman and Wiker had lost all year.
Dietzman and Wiker weren’t shaken in the least. In fact, Sequim coach Mark Textor said losing that set just seemed to make them more determined.
“It motivated them. They played brilliantly” after dropping the first set, he said.
“I went out to talk to them [after the first set] and asked if they thought they could win. They said, ‘coach, we got this. We’re going to win’,” Textor said. “They really wanted it.”
Dietzman and Wiker stormed back to win the second set 6-2 and the third set 6-1, finally getting past the Sammamish duo. They not only won a state championship as a doubles team, Sequim High School also gets credit for an overall girls team tennis championship because no other school at the state tournament tallied as many points as Dietzman and Wiker.
“We played really aggressive at the net. We were good at the ground strokes, we communicated really well. We supported each other,” Wiker said.
Wiker thinks the match turned when they broke Sammamish’s serve.
“We knew we could do it. We just felt it,” Wiker said.
“We just kept a positive mindset,” said Dietzman. “We knew we still had lots of time.”
Textor said Dietzman and Wiker were simply a better team this year. They were better at strategy and “they were super-hungry.”
“They came so close last year, they were laser focused all year,” Textor said.
One of the unique things about Dietzman and Wiker winning is unlike a lot of elite tennis players, they don’t actually play tennis year-round. Wiker played volleyball in the fall and basketball in the winter for the Wolves, while Dietzman played soccer in the fall and basketball in the winter.
Dietzman said a lot of the girls at state are year-round club players who play at indoor facilities, while Sequim only has outdoors courts.
Textor thinks playing other sports actually helped the Sequim pair.
“They’re used to pressure, they’re in good shape, they’re used to intense competition,” Textor said.
In being a soccer and basketball player, Dietzman in particular is used to running around a lot. She thinks playing other sports gives her a “scrappiness” to chase after balls in tennis.
It was the first Sequim team tennis championship since 2007. Textor said Dietzman and Wiker made it to the title match despite a tough draw that had them playing some of the toughest teams in the state right out of the gate. In fact, a WF West team they beat in the semifinals went on to take third place in the state. A Bellingham team they beat finished seventh.
Textor thinks that in addition to being intense tennis players, Dietzman and Wiker are good kids on top of that.
“They’re such a joy to coach, they’re just such nice people,” Textor said. “I was super, super excited for them.”
“It’s surreal,” Dietzman said of the state title. “It really feels like a redemption [for the 2018 finals].”
“We’re state champions. It will be there forever that we won it,” said Wiker.
Sequim’s Jessica Dietzman, left, and Kalli Wiker during their state championship match Saturday against Nina Vongslay and Katrina Kuntz of Sammamish on Saturday at the Nordstrom Tennis Center in Seattle.
