Twice on Saturday, En-Tso Liou and Helene Collin dropped the first match of a late-round consolation match at the IHSA State tournament, and both times they battled back for win on their way to a fifth-place finish.
Their secret? Lots of yelling.
"Badminton really is an etiquette sport, with a lot of golf claps," Collin said. "It's not like football where there's screaming and everything. But I used to play volleyball so I bring that same type of cheering. I'd yell like, we're going to win this, after we lost for the first time. This is not our last game. Let's go."
Hui Zhu and Holly Trapp ended up in the final 16, and the team took fifth overall.
"I mean this is definitely an experience to remember," Zhu said. "I'm really proud of all us. Even the team at home helped build us up to be who we are today. I'm so proud to be a part of this."
The fifth place finish for both Liou and Collin and the team is the best in school history according to IHSA records.
"It was funny after every game we couldn't stress about our next match cause we'd go watch them play," Trapp said. "We'd cheer for them and hope they made it too. It was a great experience."
Collin and Liou capped their tourney with a 21-13, 21-13 win over Nitya Nagrajan and YunWei Liang from Matea Valley to finish fifth.
The Barbs finished in a four-way tie for fifth with 6.5 points. Stevenson won the tourney with 25.5 points.
Hui Zhu and Holly Trapp also reached the final day Saturday, but lost to Jasmine Caro and Sharon Wu from Fremd in the fifth consolation round. Liou and Collin needed a comeback in that round against Bella Burns and Sarah Katz from Buffalo Grove but won, 16-21, 21-9, 21-13.
In the consolation quarters, they needed another comeback against Stephanie Liang and Kathleen Nie from Naperville North, 13-21, 21-16, 21-17.
They then rolled to straight-set wins in the semis and final – including 21-4, 21-11 against Julianna Rylko and Hannah Kearney from Wheaton Warrenville South in the semis.
"We all got more confidence as we played our game," Liou said. "We plated really hard and by the end we were really confident."
All four players said it was an amazing feeling to be part of the history-making DeKalb squad.
"I'm just so full of pride right now, and amazement," Collin said. "And not just for me and En-Tso but for Hui and Holly and the whole program. DeKalb has always been an underdog. We were seeded 15th and Hui and Holly weren't seeded at all. And they tied for ninth and we made it all the way to fifth to medal. Everyone thought we were a giant underdog.