Analy's Jade Wight out to perfect her tennis game

It can be difficult keeping the competitive fire when you’ve won all but one league tennis match in your entire high school history.

Analy senior Jade Wight hasn’t even lost a game in her senior season.

But the two-time reigning Sonoma County League singles champ and All-Empire first-team selection acknowledges there is still room for improvement in her game.

She has helped her Tigers keep atop the SCL standings this year, also going undefeated as a team.

With about a month left in the season before the league tournament and sectionals begin, Wight is working on her serves and volleys - and the mental aspects of the game.

“Ground strokes have always been my strong suit,” Wight said this week. “I’m pretty aggressive at the baseline. I’ve been working on my volleys and coming to the net more.”

Her longtime coach, Rick Passero, has pushed Wight this season.

“She’s winning 6-0, 6-0 all the time,” he said. “Sometimes I have to tell her, ‘Practice your serve and volley; you have this match.’ Otherwise she can just sit back and hit the ground stroke, because the other kids will hit a few, then they miss.”

That’s been the story for the past four years, really.

Wight, who’s been playing since she was 5, follows in the footsteps of her two older siblings, sister Pearl and brother Nick. Both the elder Wights were top players as well. Pearl was a No. 1 player at Analy, as was Nick, who went on to become a top player at Santa Rosa Junior College.

Jade said she began to love the game after her father built a court in their backyard for the kids to practice on.

So when she entered high school, she was already more experienced and stronger than most of her competitors.

Still, how does a new freshman break into a team with returning top-two players who were upperclassmen?

“The other girls knew about her,” Passero said. “She was going to be the best player on the team as a freshman, and potentially the best player in the league. So there was pressure on her. There was pressure on the juniors and seniors on my team who played No. 1 and 2 the year before, who were going to be bumped down by this little freshman.”

But Passero had honest discussions with all his players.

“It was really great,” he said, having avoided the potential landmines. “The senior girls took Jade under their wing and Jade was very humble about who she was. Those things had to happen.”

The coach said watching Wight mature as a teammate has been particularly rewarding.

“What’s been fun for me as a coach has been Jade becoming one of those girls who is leading and talking to the other kids and taking care of other kids on the team the same way,” he said. “The progression of that aspect is my favorite - the social development.”

Wight finished her freshman year undefeated and lost in the league final.

As a sophomore, she lost her first match of the season - to the Petaluma player who’d beaten her in the SCL final.

“It was one of those times I got too upset and let it take over in the game,” Wight said. “Next time we played them, I beat her.”

She won the SCL title and advanced to NCS play, where she said she “did way better than I was expecting to.”

She won her first match but was knocked out in the second round. Still, winning an NCS round as an SCL player was impressive, Passero said.

Wight’s junior year was flawless again, and she advanced to the league final for a third time.

It didn’t appear to be her day.

“I got nervous,” she said. “I didn’t go on the court with my top game.”

She won the first set, lost the second and was down 5-1 in the third. Defeat seemed imminent.

But she clawed her way back and won in a 7-point tiebreaker.

“I was going in so unsure of myself. I was too stiff. I had to finish the match being very careful, not making mistakes. I don’t usually play defensively.”

She was knocked out in the first round of sectionals again.

This year, she hopes to break through that line.

“She is playing very consistently and smart,” Passero said. “She is just hitting her shots and not rushing. Mostly, she’s in charge.”

Wight has shored up her mental game this season, too, he said. Win or lose, she doesn’t lose it emotionally.

“Whether she’s on top or someone beats her, she’s playing to her level often,” he said. “So you don’t walk off the court saying, ‘I missed all my shots today,’ you walk off saying, ‘That person beat me.’ That’s OK. She recognizes that.

“That’s a level of maturity on her part, that’s a mature competitor to me.”

You can reach Lori A. Carter at 707-521-5470 or lori.carter@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter?@loriacarter.