BELTON — By Lake Morris

Special to the Anderson Independent-Mail

Monday morning’s girls’ 16-year-old tournament finale had to seem like déjà vu. For Columbia’s Alexis Prickett, it was too much déjà vu, as she was defeated by Molly O’Koniewski in straight sets 6-4, 6-2.

In previous matches, Prickett, the two seed, had been able to “keep it close” in the first set, but then O’Koniewski, the top seed, had been able to blow by her in the second set, and the same spelled true at the Belton Tennis Center in Belton.

“She played really solid, she never let up,” said Prickett. “She is just a great player, a very nice player, too.”

The soft spoken, hard-hitting O’Koniewski summed up her feelings of winning the tournament in her first appearance as great. “It was a fun tournament to play, and I really enjoyed it,” she said.

O’Koniewski said the striking resemblances and similarities of the prior matches with Prickett were merely coincidence.

“I think it just happened like that,” she said.

One thing that O’Koniewski seemed to do was get Prickett running to the corners, and then charge the net and deliver a hard shot to the corner that Prickett was running from.

“I enjoy charging the net when I get the opportunity,” she said.

Prickett did have a foot injury that required attention from the trainer during and after the match, but she said it really didn’t affect her late in the match.

“Even though the score was closer in the first set, I’d say it was hurting more then than it did in the second,” she said.

“It was all Molly (O’Koniewski) out there. She just played a great game,” said Prickett.

Prickett, who said she will probably move up to the 18-year-old division next year, looks to return to the finals.

“Hopefully I’ll stay injury free next year.”

She also said that if she did return to the 16-year old division, that she would love to go against O’Koniewski again next year, but under one stipulation.

“I’d like to play her in the finals again,” she said. “I don’t want to draw her early.”

O’Koniewski, who will still be 14 next year, said she would like to play again in the tournament; it just depends on how her year goes.

“It would be great to have a shot at repeating,” she said. “Alexis (Prickett) is just a great player. We always have good matches.”