Atlantic @ Creston Boys

Creston 6, Atlantic 3

Singles:

#1 Mitch Leiferman 12 (A) over Ryan Hanson 12 (C) 10-3
#2 Colby Taylor 11 (C) over Tyler Fischer 11 (A) 10-8
#3 Bryce McIlravy 11 (C) over Matt Cook 12 (A) 9-2 (def.)
#4 Adam Bochart 11 (C) over Gunnar Blum 12 (A) 11-9
#5 Dylan Hower 12 (C) over Scott Caslow 11 (A) 10-2
#6 Jake Areneson 10 (A) over Eric Lanning 12 (C) 11-10 (7-4 tiebreak)

Doubles:

#1 Taylor/McIlravy (C) over Leiferman/Blum (A) 10-7
#2 Fischer/Noah Welter 11 (A) over Hanson/Lanning (C) 10-1
#3 Bochart/Hower (C) over Arneson/Rob Nichols 12 (A) 10-5

Coach Shawn Petersen Comments:

Tough day for the Trojans in a lot of ways; first, getting beat is never fun, but worse than that, we may have lost Matt Cook for the season with a knee injury — he got injured late in his singles match and may be done for the year — we’ll find out more later.  At #1 Mitch got a nice win over a seasoned and talented Hanson by playing big — both guys are big hitters but Mitch was more consistent and figured out some weaknesses and got the win. Tyler at #2 was down big early then rallied to get it close late but couldn’t finish off Taylor. At #3 Matt was up early, but then McIlravy really turned it on and almost had the match closed out before Matt got hurt and couldn’t finish. Gunnar at #4 was up 8-7 and serving late, but his inexperience showed a little bit and he couldn’t close out the experienced Bochart who played high-percentage tennis and got the key win for Creston.  At #5 Scott got buzzsawed a little bit by the senior Hower, who played awfully well and didn’t let Scott get much going in the match.  Jake at #6 played a fantastic match against last year’s #2 player for Creston — Jake had to fight off a couple of match points late then forced a tiebreak that he won 7-4 — the best win of Jake’s young career.  Being down 4-2 after singles meant that we needed to sweep doubles to steal the meet, and we couldn’t get it done.  We lost at #1 doubles 10-7 — after getting down early 4-1, our guys rallied to within one late but Creston held us off for the clinching dual point.  At #2 a bright spot for Atlantic was Tyler and Noah — their match took maybe 25 minutes over a veteran team from Creston — Noah and Tyler really played well and got a great win for us.  At #3 Rob Nichols substituted in for Matt and played quite well alongside Jake, but they ultimately came up short for Creston’s final point.

Overall, more credit should be given to Creston for the win than being upset for anything our guys did to lose — they are a veteran hardworking group who have 6 3-year starters in their lineup — ultimately it came down to the fact that there were 4 tight matches and they won 3 of them, and that’s what decides close duals.  Our guys will regroup, and we’ll have to figure out our lineup after Matt’s injury, but we’ll be ready to go for a tough trip to Glenwood, another veteran talented team, on Tuesday.

Creston Girls at Atlantic

Creston 8 Atlantic 1

Singles:

#1 Tori Dolch 11 (A) over Siera Jones 12 (C) 8-6
#2 Audrey Fyock 10 (C) over Leah Tjepkes 10 (A) 8-1
#3 Angela Phipps 12 (C) over Lexi Allen 10 (A) 8-4
#4 Emma Johnson 11 (C) over Abby Johnson 11 (A) 8-1
#5 Abbey Bakerink 12 (C) over Lisa Gearheart 10 (A) 8-0
#6 Ashley Harris 9 (C) over Kaley Miller 11 (A) 8-6

Doubles:

#1 Jones/Phipps (C) over Dolch/Tjepkes (A) 8-2
#2 Fyock/Johnson (C) over Allen/Johnson (A) 8-1
#3 Bakerink/Harris (C) over Gearheart/Miller (A) 8-1

Coach Shawn Petersen Comments:

Much like on the boys side, Creston returned virtually their entire lineup from last year, who gave us a good match then when we were loaded with seniors — I figured this to be a tough matchup for our girls and that proved to be the case.  At #1, Tori got her first win as the #1 player, rallying late after being down the entire match to get the win 8-6 — really happy for Tori for the win and proud of her coming back to win a match.  Leah was off most of the night and couldn’t find the range, in losing to a talented Fyock girl.  Lexi kind of got away from her power game a little too much and lost — hopefully she’ll learn to stick to what she’s best at, which is staying on the offense and getting her big forehand going, b/c she has a lot of power in that swing.  Abby continues to work at the tough #4 spot — Abby’s a first-year player, and being varsity #4 first year out is not easy, but Abby will keep working at it b/c she has a great attitude.  At #5 Lisa got beat by the senior Bakerink, but I really like Lisa’s athleticism and know that she has a bright future.  Kaley almost got a win for us at #6 — Kaley’s come a long way and keeps making strides.  In doubles, the girls struggled most of the night against Creston’s big serve games and had a hard time getting anything going — we definitely have a long ways to go in doubles, and just need to keep working to get better every day, so that hopefully we can find some more success down the road.