Cyclone Girls’ Tennis Adjusting to Switch to Fall

Cyclone Girls’ Tennis Adjusting to Switch to Fall -

(8-13-25) – It comes with its pros and cons.

High school girls’ tennis has moved to the fall this year and Harlan Community Coach Michael Rueschenberg likes some aspects of the change.

“The girls can hit all season long,” Rueschenberg told KNOD Sports. We've had open courts all season long, all summer long and it's just not super cold and windy like it is in the spring.

“We're able to have some open courts throughout the summer, where the girls can just come and hit. So, they have actually been playing more tennis now leading into this season than they would in the spring.”

But there are drawbacks to the early start.

“Just not having enough practice time. A lot of other sports wouldn't have 4 practices before the 1st football game or 4 practices before the 1st volleyball match or the first basketball game. They would obviously have more practices and have time to get ready, so we were just kind of upset that we were only given 4 practices before the season gets got started and we're hoping that maybe is a change next year.”

The Cyclones have started slow, falling in their first two contests to Denison-Schleswig, 7-2, and Lewis Central 9-0. They’re coming off a spring season where they were 5 and 5, but lost exchange students Naia Ojeda and Julia Pando from last season and are looking to new players to step up.

Rueschenberg likes the leadership that new recruit Lauren Schmitz is providing his team. Schmitz couldn’t previously participate in tennis due to her commitment to soccer.

“The things that Lauren does really well is she's just athletic. She plays a lot of other sports, basketball, softball, soccer and now tennis. So, she just kind of knows how to compete is the biggest thing about Lauren. She knows how to compete. She wants to win. She works really, really hard in practice and she's super coachable.”

Harlan Community will look to get their first win on the fall season when they compete against Southwest Valley on Thursday.

View past scores by visiting the Iowa High School Athletic Association's website, Iowa Girls High School Athletic Union website,
or Iowa Quik Stats