DeForest girls tennis wins Dane County Invitational

DeForest opened its 2026 girls tennis season by winning the Dane County Invitational on Saturday, Aug. 15.

In the eight-team field with local teams from the Madison area in attendance, DeForest won the invite convincingly, scoring 45 team points. DeForest was 13 points ahead of second-place finisher Madison Memorial, who finished Saturday’s invite with 32 team points.

Representing DeForest at No. 1 singles was Lillian Krieg. In her two matches, she defeated Sun Prairie East 6-3, 6-3 before falling to Stoughton, 6-2 and 6-3.

Headlining No. 2 singles for DeForest was Lillian Henrickson. Henrickson faced three matches on Saturday, going 2-1 overall. She defeated Monona Grove 6-3, 6-2 and Stoughton 6-2, 6-0. Her lone loss came to Madison Memorial, 6-1 and 6-0.

At No. 3 singles, Emerson Meek took the charge, going a perfect 3-0 on the day. Meek defeated Stoughton 6-1, 6-3 before winning her next two matches in three sets. Facing Monona Grove, Meek dropped her first set, 7-5, before winning the next two sets by scores of 6-1 and 10-4.

Tournament results

In her final match against Madison Memorial, Meek won her first set 6-1, lost her second set 7-5, but responded with a 10-3 victory to cap an undefeated outing to open the season.

Another undefeated Norski on Saturday was Lauren Koeller at No. 4 singles.

Facing Madison Memorial in her first match, Koeller lost her first set 6-1. However, she strung together a pair of tight victories, 7-5 and 10-8, to claim her first win of the year.

Koeller cruised the rest of the way, defeating Monona Grove 6-1, 6-0 and Sun Prairie East 6-0, 6-2 to mark a perfect day on the courts.

Heading over to doubles, DeForest's No. 1 doubles tandem of Atley Rauber and Allie Nordness teamed up for two victories.

Rauber and Nordness quickly dispatched their first two opponents, McFarland and Stoughton, winning each set 6-1. In their final match of the day, the duo fell 6-4, 6-4 to Monona Grove.

Representing DeForest at No. 2 doubles was the duo of Addisyn Basham and Evangeline Linzner. The tandem won all three of their matches — doing so handily.

Starting against Madison La Follette, Basham and Linzner breezed to 6-1, 6-0 victories. The tandem then recorded 6-1, 6-3 victories over Stoughton before defeating Monona Grove 6-2, 6-1 to finish their day undefeated.

And that wasn’t the last duo to go undefeated, either.

Molly Finnegan and Ella Finnegan, representing DeForest at No. 3 doubles, won all three of their matches just as handily.

The Finnegan duo started their undefeated day with a 6-2, 6-0 victory over Madison East before defeating Madison Memorial 6-4, 6-1. In their last matchup of the day, they cruised past Sun Prairie East, winning their two sets 6-1, 6-2.

Up next for the Norski girls’ tennis team, DeForest will travel to the La Crosse Tennis Invite on Friday, Aug. 21 and Saturday, Aug. 22. DeForest will then open league play, hosting Milton on Tuesday, Aug. 25 and Waunakee on Thursday, Aug. 27. According to Bound Wisconsin, both matches are scheduled to start at 4:15 p.m.

Additional details

Dane County Invite Team Scores

1.) Deforest (45 Points)

2.) Madison Memorial (32 Points)

3.) Monona Grove (27 Points)

4.) Sun Prairie East (24 Points)

5.) Stoughton (21 Points)

6.) McFarland (18 Points)

7.) Madison East (11 Points)

8.) Madison La Follette (7.5 Points)