Wilmot’s Rosentreter and Hammond State Tennis Champs
Duo Just Wanted to Play – Then Greatness Snowballed
Halle Rosentreter and Gwen Hammond just wanted the chance to play together.
Rosentreter hadn’t played since her freshman year due to a back injury. She started playing a little bit in January, and reached out to Hammond in February. “I told her, ‘You know Gwen, if we play doubles for high school, I really think we can win state.'”
Halle started playing tennis at age five, and Gwen started at age four.
Wilmot tennis head coach, Lisa Obertin, had no expectations to have her former freshman star back on the roster in 2020. “I hadn’t seen her, so I didn’t even realize that she was gearing up for a comeback actually,” Obertin laughed.
Then COVID showed up, and high school sports were taken away indefinitely.
But on July 23rd the WIAA voted 8-3 to begin fall sports, with a late start, and no guarantee to finish the season, or have playoffs. The chance to play was back alive.
However, with a limited schedule, the duo would stay separated, and take the #1 and #2 spots in singles. It looked like the season would simply end after the abbreviated schedule, and they might not get the chance to play together.
But the WIAA later ruled that tennis would have a sectional and state tournament.
Obertin got excited, and knew the pair could now come together and make a special run, ” When I found out there was going to be a state tournament. I think it was very up in the air. I was not anticipating, when we got into our season, that a state tournament was actually happening. So when we got to the tail end of our season, all of a sudden, I heard, ‘State tournament, in Lake Geneva’, and I went ‘Whoa! I need to be able to change something up here, because I can’t NOT put the two of them together. I knew I needed to put the two of them together. I knew that they could be fabulous together. They had wanted to play together under a regular season, and that got sidelined because of our short limited schedule. So, I’m like ‘We have to do this.’ They wanted to play together. Now, game is on, with the post-season. I knew immediately that they could get seeded into the tournament. I knew that. And that’s why we had to go forward with it. I didn’t know how [far they could go], because I hadn’t got to see anybody really play. As soon as I started to see, when we got into the sub-sectional and sectional, I knew it could be good. I knew that we had something. Just looking at other records, and head-to-heads, I was feeling good.”
They joined together and were competing in the Southern Lakes Conference tournament, when suddenly, there were some positive COVID tests back at Wilmot High School. The school board made the decision to shut down all sports, immediately. Hammond and Rosentreter were forced to forfeit and withdraw from the SLC tourney, while winning, and the favorites to take the title. It looked like their season was over, right there. It looked like the dream was over.
But then, after a 14-day shutdown, the two attended a special school board meeting, in the 11th hour, to try to get permission to compete for the WIAA state tournament. With COVID numbers dropping in the school, and safety measures presented, the board voted to let the two compete for the WIAA state championship.
The dream was back alive.
They placed 3rd in their sectional with a tough loss to Franklin. “It was really an off match, where the take away had to be from the loss was that we lost in three sets, and and not two,” Obertin said.
The 3rd place finish at sectionals sent them into the state tournament as the #8 seed (of 40). Hammond said, “I didn’t think about seeding. I don’t think seeding matters. I think it is your passion, and what you want. Of course I wanted it. I’m very competitive. I always look for great opportunities, and I knew this was one I couldn’t pass up. So I went in hungry for trying my best, and going as far as I can, and making people proud, and representing our school. I was happy to be there. I am always happy to be there. I am grateful for the opportunities.”
In the state tournament, they opened with a bye, then beat Central and Brookfield East, before advancing to knock out the undefeated #1 seed Homestead (30-0). They then beat #4 Franklin (21-3) in 2 sets, overcoming the sectional loss a week earlier. And that advanced them into the WIAA state final match vs #3 Arrowhead (16-3), where they beat the duo of Hannah Cady and Anna Long 7-5 in the first set, then dominated the second set 6-1 to win the 2020 state championship. Here is a link to their 2020 WIAA state bracket:
Hammond described Rosentreter‘s style, “”She is a very strong player. She works hard every day. She is a very driven player. She is so much fun to play with. She’s always motivated. She goes for it. She’s a great player. She’s put in a lot of work. It’s a great opportunity to play with her.”
Rosentreter said of Hammond , “I am so honored to be able to play with her. She is such a strong player. She just has the mentality that, ‘We are just doing this for fun.’ I know that she is younger than me, but I still look up to her as a player, and I’m just really excited to see all the amazing things she does after I leave. She has just always been very fun for me to play with. I am so blessed that I got to share this experience with her, because there is no one else I would rather experience it with than her.… So just that we were able to even play at state was a huge honor. And there is absolutely no one else I would have rather won with. She is the best person I could have done it with, so I am very thankful for the whole experience.”
Hammond on Coach Obertin, “She helped a lot during matches, and before matches, mentally. I like her style. I look forward to having her for two more years.”
Coach Obertin said this of Hammond, “Gwen is just great all round. Great all around team player. She came out as a freshman. She was coming off a wrist issue, so she’s had to work herself back into the game. Because tennis, it’s a lot of wrist. So she’s worked back up at getting closer to a level that she had been at, previously to even her freshman year, so this is quite an accomplishment. She also came off of an injury that could have sidelined her tennis career also. So it’s exciting to see as a sophomore she’s been able to rehab from that, come out as a a sophomore, and I can’t wait to see what happens. She’s got two more years of tennis, that I would think, she’ll probably have a lot of people knocking on her door if she would like to play college tennis too.”
Rosentreter on her confidence level going into the state tournament, “When I had talked to Gwen in February, because I started playing again in January. I told her, ‘You know Gwen, if we play doubles for high school, I really think we can win state. And so going into it, the loss against Franklin (at sectional) I thought we didn’t play our best, so I wasn’t super-worried about it. We had practiced a ton. We were super-prepared. We were really excited. It was both excitement to just be there, and it was also like, ‘I think we can win the whole thing.”
Hammond on the Wilmot Wall-of-Fame, “”I think it’s hard for me to visualize just how big of a deal it is. I feel like I did my best, and I’m so proud of myself. I think it’s really cool that I get to share this experience with Halle….. It’s definitely something I’ll remember and I’m grateful for.”
Coach Lisa Obertin said this of her sister, and assistant coach Jennifer Obertin, “Honestly we couldn’t do it without her. She does an amazing job“
Hammond sounds motivated for her next two years, “I am more of a singles player than I am a doubles player. I do doubles, but I think I’m going to really go to work, and get in shape, and get ready to play singles the next two years.”
– submitted photo
Congratulations ladies! You’ll always be STATE CHAMPIONS.
