King’s Fork High School’s girls’ tennis team lost its top five players from last year, but the team is still hopeful for a solid season this year.

The Lady Bulldogs are currently 1-2, with their one win coming against Indian River High School. Their two losses have come in close matches.

After graduating five seniors last year, Coach Calvin Mitchell has had to help his returning players assume bigger roles on the team. He says he is happy with what he has seen so far.

King’s Fork’s top two players this seasons are seniors Selina Davis and Agnes Dotse. Davis joins Daneja Thomas to make up the Lady Bulldogs’ top doubles team.

A few second-year players also have made big improvements from last year.

“They are picking up the skills and are improving on them daily,” Mitchell said of his second-year players. “It has made a world of difference in their games. We emphasize the basics in order to get better.”

Mitchell’s goal for his team is just to simply get better. He wants his team to continue to progress throughout the season. They stuck to that same plan last year, and that resulted in the team competing in regionals for the first time in school history.

“We want to continue playing without fear of losing,” Mitchell said. “We want to just play and enjoy the game and hopefully doing that leads us to regionals again.”

Before making it to regional play last season, King’s Fork finished second in the Conference 17 standings. Great Bridge High School finished first, and Mitchell expects his team to get its toughest matches against Great Bridge again this season.

King’s Fork will take on rival Lakeland High School at home at 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday.