Just like many athletes do growing up, throughout the year at tennis practice Hutchinson High junior Abby Brown and senior Grace Proett would use their imaginations and visualize. Whenever they hit with assistant coach Mel Dower and Kriss Fee, they’d say to each other, “This point’s for state,” and pretend they are pitted in that moment. Saturday they faced this exact scenario against a doubles team from Wichita Northwest at regionals in Dodge City. Proett and Brown led 9-8 in a tiebreaker and had a shot to clinch a state berth with a second-round victory. Right before she received a serve, Proett couldn’t help but reference their running gag to Brown in order to keep things loose. “We’d joke around and say this point is for state, then when the tiebreaker was us 9-8, I went over to Abby and said ‘This really is for state Abby. This one actually is,’” Proett said. The Salthawk duo won the point and secured a spot to state against a team that beat them earlier in the season at an invitational at Derby. Brown and Proett went on to finish fourth at the regional. “After that point we just instantly ran over to each other and hugged, we were just so happy,” Brown said. “It was a good day to be able to say we qualified for state.” On the season, Proett and Brown have an 11-16 record. But as coach Robert Nixon says to his players, records mean nothing at regionals. For Nixon, seeing a duo that exited early last year at regionals and took lumps throughout the past two seasons rise up to the occasion was special. “They did get better,” Nixon said. “We were losing to really good teams probably 8-2, 8-1, but they were playing hard. I’m very proud of them. They worked their butts off and did everything I asked.” To make a state appearance possible, Nixon and the doubles tandem credited working better together, footwork and increased confidence. But most importantly, Proett and Brown learned to keep their emotions in check during matches. “I think the biggest thing is that we got our emotions under control instead of getting upset,” Proett said. “Just getting our emotions under control just evens out the playing and lets us compete with anybody.” Brown said she battled some temper demons early during the season. Eventually, she realized she couldn’t get angry at herself because it would let down her friend and teammate. “We don’t get mad at each other, but when one of us starts to get upset, it definitely reflects on the other one,” Brown said. Nixon and Dower, who Nixon praised for making his job easier, are taking their first doubles team to state in Olathe today. Nixon said he hopes Brown and Proett joining returning state singles qualifier Raegan Wessel signals a program trend. “We’re getting better, I like the climb,” Nixon said. “Hopefully we have five or six next season. It’d be nice.”