Boys at Atlantic: Atlantic 9, Kuemper 0

Singles:

#1 Mitch Leiferman 12 (A) over Brian Dentlinger 12 (K) 10-1
#2 Tyler Fischer 11 (A) over Robby Steffes 10 (K) 10-6
#3 Matt Cook 12 (A) over Mitchell Behrens 10 (K) 10-4
#4 Gunnar Blum 12 (A) over Michael Van Erdewyk 11 (K) 10-2
#5 Scott Caslow 11 (A) over Matthew Irlbeck 10 (K) 10-8
#6 Jake Arneson 10 (A) over Kenan Schrad 11 (K) 10-4

Doubles:

#1 Leiferman/Blum (A) over Dentlinger/Steffes (K) 10-6
#2 Fischer/Noah Welter 11 (A) over Behrens/Van Erdewyk (K) 10-6
#3 Cook/Arneson (A) over Irlbeck/Schrad (K) 10-3

Coach Shawn Petersen Comments:

Good win for the boys to start the year; Kuemper graduated 9 of their top 11 from last season’s conference champions, and are in rebuilding mode; having said that, we had three guys who hadn’t played a varsity match before in our lineup.  With a lot of new guys, you never know how they’ll react under the lights, so overall I was really pleased with our play.  Mitch got off to a slow start, losing his first game, then rolled to the win with 10 straight games and played a really smart match.  Tyler had a tight match early on with Steffes — Tyler then tightened things up and ran off 5 or 6 games in a row and finished off the talented Steffes.  At #3, Matt Cook was in a tight match as well, as game #7 had 10 or 11 deuce points, but Matt won that game to go up 5-2 and rode that momentum to the win.  Gunnar Blum, in his first real tennis match ever, got up 8-0 right out of the chute, and cruised to victory.  At #5 was the tightest match — I thought Scott was the better player, but he showed some nerves in his first start on varsity and got in his own way a little bit; however, he found a way to win, which was great for Scott and for the team.  He can play better and will have better showings with more experience.  At #6, Jake started out a little tight as well, but once he started relying on his strokes, he started to dominate the match.  Jake has a good balance of offense and defense in his game, and played very well for us.

In doubles, I thought we played pretty well overall — Mitch really dominated his doubles match, particularly on his serve, and Gunnar should make a good partner with Mitch with his size and athleticism at the net.  Noah and Tyler had a workmanlike win at #2 and at times can be a dominating team as long as they stay aggressive at the net.  At #3 Jake and Matt started out a little slow, but then started to serve better and rolled to a nice win to cap off the night for us.

The boys will need to play better at Creston at Thursday, as they return all 6 of their starters from last year and are hungry to get a win against us — looking forward to the challenge.  We need to clean up some fundamentals if we are going to be able to beat them at their place.

Girls at Carroll — Kuemper 8, Atlantic 1

Singles:

#1 Leah Greteman 10 (K) over Tori Dolch 11 (A) 10-3
#2 Sami Schmitz 11 (K) over Leah Tjepkes 10 (A) 10-6
#3 Lexi Allen 10 (A) over CoryAnn Steinkamp 11 (K) 10-6
#4 Mattie Potthoff 10 (K) over Abby Johnson 11 (A) 10-0
#5 Carla Knobbe 10 (K) over Lisa Gearheart 10 (A) 10-1
#6 Nicole Becker 10 (K) over Kaley Miller 11 (A) 10-4

Doubles:

#1 Greteman/Schmitz (K) over Dolch/Tjepkes (A) 10-8
#2 Steinkamp/Potthoff (K) over Allen/Johnson (A) 10-4
#3 Knobbe/Tayler Boldt 10 (K) over Gearheart/Libby Gifford 11 (A) 10-2

Coach Shawn Petersen Comments:

Tough night for the girls, but not unexpected; none of the Atlantic girls had any varsity experience and I think there was some definite nerves out there.  It was a learning experience, certainly, and I am confident the girls will continue to get better as the season progresses.  At #1 Tori was in a tight one down 4-3, then started making errors and got on a downward slide.  At #2 Leah played well vs the veteran Schmitz, and came up a little bit short.  Our brightest spot was at #3 with Lexi playing aggressively and getting her first win in her first start.  Abby at #4 didn’t play as well as she can, but I really like her upside — she’ll end up being a good player for us with more experience.  Lisa Gearheart is another new player for us, and learned some things about court positioning and aggressiveness –she’s got good athleticism and just needs more experience.  Kaley played pretty well in her first start, losing 10-4.

In doubles, Tori and Leah played a nice match, and almost pulled out the win at #1 — Leah played very well and Tori just needs more confidence in herself.  I think they’ll be a good pairing for us.  At #2 and #3 our girls were competitive but certainly need to work on consistency and posititioning on the court.

Considering our youth and inexperience, I was happy with how our girls played — it’s tough starting out the year on the road, and we look forward to bouncing back at home vs Creston on Thursday night.