Yaodong Gu is an ASU Cronkite School of Journalism student assigned to cover Marcos de Niza High School for AZPreps365.com.

 

After defeating McClintock and Cortez earlier this week, the Marcos de Niza Padres badminton team puts its winning streak on the line Wednesday when they hosted the Desert Edge Scorpions.

The Padres, who lost their first five matches this season, are now 3-5 after defeating the Scorpions, 9-0.

This is just the Scorpions’ second season of competitive badminton. They won their second match of the season against Glendale, but their season record now stands at 1-6.

Scorpions head coach Stephen Kraynick, who has 25 years of experience coaching various sports, has an optimistic view about his young team.

 “We already exceeded last year’s expectations,” Kraynick said. “We keep working on their competitive nature. We keep working on their drill skills. We are very young, which is really nice. The majority of my team are freshmen and sophomores. So, we just want to keep developing, growing and getting better.”

Padres head coach Claudia Ramirez believes her team will continue to grow as it competes against strong teams.

 “Playing higher-level teams and seeing competition is going to help them excel,” Ramirez said, “because in our little world of practice is that ‘Oh, I am the best,’ but not really, because we played in the competition, then we get shot down. So I want them to play more competitive matches.”

Although, the Scorpions lost all three doubles matches, their doubles teams played very well. The doubles team of Philana Nguyen and Natalie Figueroa played really hard and they won the only set for Scorpions, 21-19, but lost the next two sets, 21-16, 21-16.

“We do need to work on our singles by far,” Kraynick said. “We do a lot of doubles. Singles relies on coming up with different strategies, different styles, different patterns and hitting. That’s what they really need.”

The last doubles match of the night was a very close game with the Padres winning,  24-22,  22-20.

Padres junior Lucy Pham won two matches, one in singles and the other in doubles.

“I could do better,” Pham said. “I also did a little bit worse in my second game. I need to work on my stamina because I can’t keep up my really hard shots if I am tired.”

Pham also applauded her doubles partner, Olivia Dill.

“I think she did well,” Pham said. “If I had a different partner, I would not get as many points as I usually do. She is very good.”

The Padres will next host Gilbert (3-5) on Tuesday.

The Scorpions will host Dysart (2-5) on Tuesday.