WARSAW – Given the spring sports season has been a nightmare in terms of weather and adjustments, it was more than fitting that the Northern Lakes Conference Girls Tennis Championships would last well into the one o’clock hour. That’s right, 1 a.m. Saturday morning.

Dealing with the third day in a row of rain in the area, the tournament was moved indoors at the Warsaw Racquet Club and the four courts were occupied for another series of matchups. Even with the adjusted formatting of eight-game pro sets, modified tiebreakers and a continuous rotation of competitors, the one singles final between Elkhart Memorial’s Krystal Grubb and Concord’s Jenna Landis didn’t officially begin until 11:43 p.m. Friday night.

With both Grubb and Landis already having played a match Friday in the semis, the weary competitors closed out the marathon tournament at 1:07 a.m. Grubb closed out a perfect regular season with a 6-1, 6-4 win over Landis in the tourney’s final match.

Memorial’s Corinn Whitaker won the two singles title over Northridge’s Kylie Frauhiger in a convincing 6-2, 6-2 final.

The Lady Charger’s Taelor Grose and Haley Stouder rode the No. 1 seed to a title, breaking down Northridge’s Emily Erekson and Courtney Clark 7-6 (7-4), 6-3 in the one doubles final.

The three titles were fitting for Memorial, which ran undefeated in the round robin with a 7-0 mark. The Lady Chargers backed it up with 40 points into the tournament to edge Northridge’s 38 for the outright title. Concord were third at 33 and Plymouth one back at 32. Warsaw and NorthWood tied with 28 points, Goshen were seventh at 22 and Wawasee did not score at the tournament.

Plymouth grabbed a title at two doubles, with Libbie Portteus and Lanae Singleton winning a marathon match with NorthWood’s Madison Sheline and Alaina Donegan. Wood won the first set, 6-4, before Plymouth returned the favor, 6-4, in set two. The tiebreaker also went the distance, with Plymouth winning 11-9 in the super-tiebreaker.

Rachel Alexander of Warsaw had a chance at a title at three singles, and nearly rallied herself into one. Losing the first set 6-0 quickly to Plymouth’s Jessica Stillson, it looked as though the Plymouth junior would run away with the title. Alexander, however, stormed back with a 6-4 win in the second set in classic fashion, letting her ground strokes do the talking while her serves began to find consistent ground.

In the super-tiebreaking third set, Stillson and Alexander exchanged leads before Stillson pulled away for a 10-6 win.

“Rachel showed a lot of nerves in that first set, she made a lot of simple mistakes that she didn’t in the second set when she relaxed,” Warsaw head coach Rick Orban said. “Those nerves showed up again in the third set, but sometimes that’s just how tennis goes. She played very well in this tournament and should be proud.”

Sarah Boyle finished third, and needed a huge rally herself to salvage a final win. Down 5-1 in the first set, Boyle put together a fierce comeback to force a tiebreaker, which she won 7-6 (7-3), then wore down Goshen’s Kathleen Morrical 6-2 in the final set.

The Warsaw two doubles team of Abbi Baum and Athena Schlitt also finished their tournament with a win, taking out Goshen’s Kayleigh Crowder and Courtney Dobrzykowski, 8-6, for fifth place.

Jacqueline Sasso played possibly her strongest match of the tournament, but fell to an equally solid Emily Hughes of Northridge, 9-7, in the one singles fifth-place match. The Lady Tiger one doubles team of Camille Kerlin and Anna Hall fell to Concord’s Shannon Purcell and Mandy Meserve, 8-4, for fifth place.

Orban was more than pleased with his team’s final showing, especially with the Warsaw Girls Tennis Sectional looming this Wednesday.

“Columbia City were probably the favorites last year, and likely they are going to come in with a chip on their shoulder,” Orban stated. “We beat them 3-2 in the first match of the season. But right now, I really like how we are playing. We’ll have two days of practice, which is a nice change. We’ll work on some of the things we saw here in the tournament and fine tune. I really like our chances.”

Wawasee, on the other hand, continued to have a season to forget.

All five of its courts finished in eighth place, and adding insult to injury, literally, lost another player to an injury in the tourney’s final day.

One doubles player Erin Wiktorowski continued to deal with a bad back but could not go while her and playing partner Addison Ayres were trailing Goshen 6-1. Wiktorowski winced in pain, then called for time and could go no more as her back gave out, forcing Wawasee into a default forfeit, but more importantly, another body down for a team that has already lost four starters this year.

“I really have no idea what to do,” offered Wawasee head coach Chris Winters, who could only shrug her shoulders in bewilderment. “It’s been one of those years. This season has just been so tough. Today was a microchasm of what we’ve dealt with all season.”

Wawasee’s singles played admirable, but didn’t have the scores to show for it. Katy Ashpole led Plymouth’s Erin Hunter 4-1 before Hunter fought back for an 8-6 victory at one singles. Jada Antonides trailed just 4-3 against Plymouth’s Kristin Riise before the Pilgrim rattled off four of the last five games to claim an 8-4 win at two singles.

Hannah Walter of NorthWood finished off Chelsea Carolus at three singles, 8-2, and Memorial’s Mady Robison and Maggie Dickerson put away Jazlyn Gehlhausen and Jaclyn Miller, 8-2, at two doubles.

Warsaw will be off until the sectional, which draws Monday. Wawasee is scheduled to be in action Monday in its final regular season match against visiting Whitko. The Lady Warriors, as well as Whitko, Columbia City and Tippecanoe Valley, all feed into the pool of the Warsaw sectional.