The Tiverton tennis team shut out Shea 7-0 in a Division 3 match at Slater Park on Thursday afternoon. The win improved the Tigers’ record to 3-1.

“Our first 7-0 win,” said senior co-captain Lexi Boissonneau. “We are excited about that.”

“We’ve been playing great,” said second year head coach Jessica Cullinan, who played tennis in high school on Cape Cod and runs a tennis group in town.

She and her assistant coaches, Samantha Rollings and Natasha Tavares acquired a young and inexperienced Division 2 team last season.

“Half the team were freshmen that had never played tennis before,” she said. “We really focused on consistency and working on basic skills. We need to work on all of it,” she said.

“We rotate and work on what's most important at the time. We also work on strategies both for singles and doubles. The team has more fire now and we're ready to have a strong season.”

“Our practices have been very strong,” said Boissonneau, the Tigers’ first singles player who won 6-1, 6-2 against her Shea opponent. “Coach has a little journal and we write down what we need to work on.”

Boissonneau, more of a serve and volley player, has been staying at the baseline more this year.

“Coach has been pounding those ground strokes on us, so baseline has my heart this season,” Boissonneau said.

Junior co-captain Courtnie Smith plays third singles for the Tigers. She played second singles against Shea due to senior Julia Keating being out.

“I played fourth singles last season,” she said. “I’ve been taking lessons continuously all year. Lessons, lessons, lessons every single Sunday. It has helped me a lot. Coach and my private coach Ron, have been just phenomenal.”

Smith rolled over her opponent, 6-1, 6-1. She feels that the team is destined to make the playoffs this season.

“I love this team. Everyone's great,” she said. “We are working very, very hard every single practice and I just feel like we are gonna go absolutely far this season.”

Scoring:

First singles player Lexi Boissonneau beat Mikha’la Campbell of Shea 6-1, 6-2, second singles player Courtnie Smith beat Lorena Fonesca of Shea 6-1, 6-1, third singles player Brooke Sowa beat Twetzyann Miranda 6-0, 6-1, fourth singles player Caroline Durost beat Angelina Rodrigues 6-2, 6-3.

First doubles team of Lia Doster and Carly Sanna beat Sephora Germeil and Solangel Vasquez 6-1, 6-0, second doubles team of Angelleena Cordeiro and Sophia Han beat Huilan Malatji and Jocelyn Cruz 6-0, 6-1 and third doubles team of Juniper Murkle and Autumn Gerlach beat Christian Siffrat and Sandra Semedo 6-1, 6-0.