Toast of the Coast: Truluck leads Myrtle Beach girls tennis to another state championship

The addition of Elizabeth Truluck to the Myrtle Beach girls tennis team didn’t turn the Seahawks into overnight sensations.

Jeri Himmelsbach’s team was coming off a run to the Class AAA state finals and was returning one of the best players in the area in Rachel Berkey. But with Truluck on board, the Seahawks returned to their state title winning ways. The standout freshman continued to impress her coach despite the two knowing each other for years.

“It’s like ‘Wow, how lucky are we?’ ” Himmelsbach said after Truluck entered Myrtle Beach for her freshman year. “It’s the most amazing feeling. She brings a calmness to the team. I knew she was good, but she’s just so talented.”

Truluck, the 2014 Toast of the Coast Player of the Year, proved that time and again.

She was 4-1 and finished fifth in the Class AAAA/AAA individual tournament in November. What she was able to do during the regular and postseason team matches was vital to the team’s success. During that span, she was 20-2 and one of the catalysts for Myrtle Beach’s 15th state championship in 30 years.

“I thought we’d be able to do well,” Truluck said. “I didn’t know we’d make it as far as we did. [Winning state] just made it even better.”

Quite a bit of that team success had to do with the two players at the top of the team’s competition ladder.

Berkey, the 2013 Toast of the Coast Player of the Year, was playing at the No. 2 spot. Between her and Truluck, the duo lost just three matches all season, with two coming in the the final two rounds of the postseason and the third coming in a rain-shortened match.

When paired up for doubles matches, they were undefeated.

The younger of two will be back not only next year, but presumably two more seasons after that.

It’s something that has the Myrtle Beach coach struggling to avoid looking too far ahead. In one season with the Seahawks, Truluck helped take the team back to the top of Class AAA tennis.

“This is like a ship with all the oars in the water,” Himmelsbach said. “Her oar became like a rudder for us. It just helped us glide through the water better.

“We’ve got the ingredients to keep it going for a while. We’ll take it one year at a time, but having Elizabeth for another three years is a great.”

This story was originally published December 19, 2014 at 5:33 PM with the headline "Toast of the Coast: Truluck leads Myrtle Beach girls tennis to another state championship."