Badminton: Eckdahl Leads Trojans to State

When Downers Grove North senior Maureen Eckdahl takes the court at the state badminton finals May 13 and 14 at Eastern Illinois University in Charleston, it will mark the end of her family’s rich tradition and, her team hopes, the continuation of the Trojans’ run as one of the top programs in the state.

Eckdahl is the youngest of three sisters who have starred for the Trojans. Her oldest sister, Katie, played singles for North’s 2006 state championship team. Another sister, Anne, was a doubles player for last year’s third-place finisher that also included Maureen at singles.

All three girls have led the Trojans to at least one state trophy—North has won nine of them in the past 11 seasons—but none of them have won an individual medal, which are awarded to the top six finishers in singles and doubles.

That could change if Eckdahl continues her dominant play. She cruised to the singles title at Thursday’s Downers Grove North Sectional, winning all three of her matches in straight sets, including a 21-15, 21-10 defeat of Hinsdale Central senior Kim Ziolkowski in the championship match.

“It felt really good,” Eckdahl said. “Going into it I wasn’t underestimating anyone. I was nervous, so I just knew I had to play my game, play my hardest and then the outcome would be good.”

Though Eckdahl was the No. 1 seed, the win over Ziolkowski was noteworthy because Ziolkowski, the No. 2 seed, had beaten her in the past and had a better pedigree. Ziolkowski was a top-12 finisher at last year’s state meet while Eckdahl lost both of her matches in her state debut.

“I just think overall my whole game has improved,” Eckdahl said. “I’ve gotten faster, I’ve tuned up and worked on a lot of different shots. My serve has gotten better. I’ve improved in basically everything.”

A lot of that improvement has occurred since the start of the season.

“There’s no question (Eckdahl) is one of the top contenders,” Downers North coach Anthony Calderone said. “What happened with her is she started out really slow and was serving six, seven, eight birdies out of bounds regularly in each game and then losing by three, four or five points.

“We turned the corner about halfway through the season, right at about spring break, and we started doing some extra work one-on-one with her and she turned the corner and it’s made a big difference.”

While she won’t be the favorite to win the singles title, Eckdahl will be a force to be reckoned with.

“That’s definitely one of my goals is to individually do well and place top 10,” Eckdahl said. “It’s kind of crazy because I remember when my oldest sister, Katie, was playing badminton when I was little, I was like, ‘I want to play badminton, I want to go to state.’ I want to finish strong, hold the Eckdahl name up. I want to do my best at state and hopefully the outcome is good.”

The outcome for the Trojans should be good, though perhaps not as good as they would have hoped coming into the sectional. Downers North would have been a slight favorite to win its fourth state team title since 2003 had it qualified its full team, but the Trojans advanced only three of their four entries thanks to their sectional being one of the toughest in the state.

North did get both of its doubles teams through, as the No. 1 duo of senior Jackie Bland and junior Anna Marek finished second, losing to Hinsdale Central’s Konstantina Rousonelos and Claire Foster 21-19, 21-15 in the final, and senior Claire Bedalov and junior Hannah Henson took third with a 21-7, 21-6 win over Hinsdale Central’s Taylor Proudfoot and Ali Gibson.

But No. 2 singles player Meghan Schmitt failed to advance. The unseeded senior won her first match before losing to Ziolkowski 21-16, 21-9 in the quarterfinals.

That meant Schmitt needed to win three straight matches in the backdraw to qualify for state. She won the first two in straight sets before meeting Downers Grove South senior Hayley Stankiewicz in the consolation semifinals.

Stankiewicz, a returning state qualifier and No. 3 seed, pulled out a marathon 21-18, 17-21, 22-20 victory to earn her second trip to state while eliminating Schmitt.

“It’s really sad,” Eckdahl said. “I wish (Schmitt) could have pulled it out. She played her hardest. She worked really hard for it all season long, so that’s really disappointing. But she’s going to cheer us on and drive us to want to win even more for her and for the team. We’ll play our hardest at state.”

With five tough singles players in the draw, Calderone knew one player deserving of a place at state would be left out and he was afraid Schmitt might be the one.

“I knew both of them were prone to unforced errors, serves out of bound and it would boil down to who made a few less than the other one,” Calderone said. “It was frustrating to watch, but you’ve got to take the good with the bad and she’s got a lot of character and she handled it as best she could.”

Calderone knows Eckdahl will handle the increased pressure of leading the Trojans at state and adding to her family legacy.

“She’s played a lot of athletics growing up, volleyball, softball, she’s done it all, so then she got into badminton and kind of followed into Katie and Anne’s footsteps and has enjoyed the sport with us and has definitely worked hard for us,” Calderone said. “So she deserves the stuff she gets.

“We’re going to lean on her. She’ll get it done, though. She’s one of the toughest kids we’ve had in a while. We’ve got a pretty tough team this year so we’re pretty happy with where we’re at mentally.”

So is Stankiewicz, the lone Mustang to qualify for state. After winning her quarterfinal match 19-21, 21-11, 21-8 over Oak Park’s Ana Spinuzza, Stankiewicz fell to Ziolkowski 21-16, 21-9 in the semifinals.

But she rebounded to beat Schmitt to earn her second straight state berth and capped her tournament with a 21-16, 21-9 win over Hinsdale Central sophomore Brina Gartlan in the third-place match.

“(Schmitt) is so good and for that game it was like every shot was important, so it was definitely tough,” Stankiewicz said.  “Usually I rush into my serves and this time I really took my time and just pulled my shots in, because I (tend to) hit a lot out.”

Stankiewicz lost both of her matches at the 2010 state finals but hopes to do better this time.

“It would be nice to do really well at state, but just being there is really great and that’s the main (reason) why I wanted to get there,” she said. “Winning a game would be nice.

I’m really excited about that.”