Edina senior Sophia Redy making final run at singles title in 2A tennis

Six seasons ago, things seemed perfectly aligned for Edina's Sophia Reddy to take her place among her team's all-time greats.

Then a seventh-grader, Reddy advanced to the Class 2A singles championship match at the 2012 girls' tennis state tournament, falling to eventual champion Summer Brills of Mounds View.

It seemed just a matter of time before Reddy would add her name to the list of state champions, perhaps more than once.

Now a senior, Reddy enters the state tournament — the team competition is Tuesday and Wednesday, individuals Thursday and Friday — with more than a half-decade of tournament experience, a recent commitment to Brown University and the No. 2 seed in the 2A singles field.

And still no title.

"I've gotten so close so many times," Reddy said. "I do wish I had one by now, but it's not something I dwell on."

Reddy has been 2A singles runner-up twice, including last year, along with a third- and a fourth-place finish. She also finished third in doubles as an eighth-grader, paired with Kelly Reger.

"I'm not sure why," she said. "Something always happens, or I don't play my best."

The belief was that this year would be different. She rolled undefeated through the season and was ranked No. 1 in Class 2A all year. But her championship-match bugaboo showed up again in the Section 6 finals, when she lost to teammate Nicole Copeland 7-5, 6-3.

"Coley played amazing," she said. "Hats to her. But I really wasn't playing my game. I couldn't close it out."

The victory earned Copeland, a sophomore, the No. 1 seed in the tournament, with Reddy right behind. Elk River's Meagan Brown is seeded No. 3.

Based on season-long results, Reddy still is considered a favorite to win the title. This year, she believes, she'll finally summit that mountain.

Class 2A: Edina, which had its 19-year streak of team state championships broken by Mahtomedi in the semifinals last year, looks poised to begin another streak. The undefeated Hornets have Reddy and Copeland, the top two singles players, and a deep lineup that includes veteran Margaux Boyer and Andrea Jansson, a talented junior whose family moved to Edina in August from Gothenburg, Sweden. Mahtomedi is back, but without one of its top players in senior Olivia Paradise, who is no longer with the team. A new singles champion is assured. The 2016 winner, Bella Lambert of Minnetonka, did not play high school tennis, focusing instead early graduation from high school to take a spot on the University of Minnesota tennis team.