GRAND FORKS — With a fighting spirit and a true team effort, the Minot High girls tennis team captured the team state title Thursday against West Fargo Sheyenne, winning 3-2.

What typically has been an Eastern Dakota Conference dominated state tournament, the Majettes broke the cycle and became the first Western Dakota Association team to win the NDHSAA State Team Tournament since 2001. The win is something Majettes head coach Scott DeLorme hopes puts the WDA back on the map for tennis, pointing out that not all the talent comes from the East.

The last team title by the Majettes was in 1991, nearly 27 years ago.

“They’ve earned it,” Majettes head coach Scott DeLorme said. “We have a mix of experience and youth on this team.”

The Majettes started Thursday with a 5-0 win over the East’s No. 4-seeded Fargo Davies in round one.

Then, Minot High went on to defeat the East’s No. 2-seeded Grand Forks Red River 4-1.

The beast in front of them was West Fargo Sheyenne.

“We all knew it was going to be a tight match from the beginning,” Majettes sophomore Haya Dodin said. “We knew we were the better team, we just had to go out and give it our all and we did.”

After three matches, West Fargo led 2-1. It came down to doubles pair Gwen Mathews and Joelle Fettig followed by Dodin in singles.

Fettig and Mathews lost their first set 7-5, but DeLorme said the girls were able to pick it up, turn it around and seal the win against Sheyenne’s Pooja Chemiti and Miranda Sommerfeld. The Majettes won their last two sets 6-4.

“To go from a set down and put forth a huge effort was really amazing by them,” he said.

Mathews said her focus was whole-heartedly in the match.

“We just knew we had to win,” Mathews recalled. As Dodin was playing on another court, the doubles pair won and watched as Dodin sealed the state championship win. “We went over to the other side of the net and Haya was up. Then, she won and it was over.”

Dodin sealed the championship with a win over Sheyenne’s Preeti Chemiti in sets of 6-1 and 6-2.

DeLorme credits every single athlete for having a big match Thursday. He said it was a true team effort to pull out the win.

“It’s honestly so surreal,” Mathews said. “I can’t wait to go home and take that banner down and add 2018.”

“I’m happy we could come out and prove that Minot is the best team in North Dakota,” Dodin said.

The girls will be riding their team win adrenaline into battle tomorrow as they tackle the individual state tournament.

“We have some talented individuals that can make a deep run,” DeLorme said. “It’ll be fun tomorrow night to have a player or two in the semifinals on the individual side.”

Today, the singles and doubles championships begin at 10 a.m. in Grand Forks. All seven Majettes advanced from the WDA Tournament and include: Haya Dodin, Raquel Egge, Eden Olson, Kali Askvig/Alyssa Henson and Gwen Mathews/Sofia Egge.

“I feel like (the win) is just giving an extra boost of confidence to everyone on the team,” Mathews said. “No matter what, I know we’re going to go out and give it our all.”