Downs and Speer into AA tennis semifinals

BOZEMAN — Weather forced a long Thursday at the State AA Tennis tournament, but that didn’t slow down Glacier’s Sarah Downs and Haven Speer.

The duo earned a spot in Friday’s semifinals after defeating Big Sky’s Chloe Dosier and Katie Williams in the first round, then topping Bozeman’s Alexis LaMeres and Sara Sanford.

The Wolfpack’s other qualifying girls pairing of Cadence and Cassidy Daniels are still in the mix for a third place finish. After a first round loss, the duo picked up a win over Taela Bauer and Kenndey Miller of Billings Skyview. They now play Missoula Hellgate’s Moana Massey and Mae Michelson.

Play moved indoors to the MSU tennis facility due to snow in Bozeman overnight.

Along with the change in venue, the tournament moved to short third sets to accommodate the large number of matches scheduled for Thursday.

Glacier’s boys doubles pairing of Sam Engellant and Will Rudbach also picked up a win in their first round match-up against Dean Gunderson and Dylan Rosenzweig from Gallatin. The victory set up a match with the top seed from the East: Skyview’s Chris Piccioni and Keaton Miller.

Wolfpack duo Carl Bitney and Dalyn Mathison dropped their first match of the tournament to Bozeman’s Collin Gross and Oliver Ward.

The lone girls singles representative for Glacier — Leilani Lennarz — dropped both her matches Thursday.

Kutuk White lost his opener to Hellgate’s Jack Currie-Welch. He defeated Caleb Binkley from Sentinel to advance into round four against Galatin’s Matt Swank.