Columbus East boys tennis coach Matt Malinsky remembered what happened to his girls tennis team this spring and didn’t want the same thing to happen to his boys team in Thursday’s Columbus North Sectional semifinals.
The Olympians came out focused on their match with Edinburgh and came away for a 4-1 victory. That set up a sectional final battle at 4:30 p.m. today against the No. 2-ranked and host Bull Dogs.
“We learned our lesson from the girls season last spring to not look past anybody and to take each match as it comes,” Malinsky said. “I think last year, we were a little bit too worried about a rematch with North, and we didn’t have ourselves in the moment. So this time, we made sure we came out focused. I told all the guys to try to get off to a really good start and try to stay ahead on the scoreboard so they can keep the pressure off.”
East (3-9) had a 1-0 lead before the matches began Thursday. As they did in Wednesday’s 3-2 opening-round win against Brown County, he Lancers (6-8) had to forfeit the No. 2 doubles match because they didn’t have enough players available due to contact tracing.
Edinburgh tied the match with Austin Brockman beat Brady Redelman 6-0, 6-1 at No. 3 singles. The Olympians regained the advantage with Matthew Degner’s 6-0, 6-2 victory against Travis Jones at No. 2 singles.
East clinched the match when Derek Heideman beat Max Blandford 6-0, 7-6 (5) at No. 1 singles. The Olympians then got a 6-4, 7-5 win from Henry Ulrich and Tyler Ernst against Ian Buchanan and Trevor Moon at No. 1 doubles.
“I was happy with getting three wins out of those four matches that were played,” Malinsky said. “It got close at 1 doubles and at 1 singles toward the end, but I’m even more proud of the fact that they were able to finish strong.”
North, meanwhile, cruised to a 5-0 win against Hauser. The Bull Dogs did not drop a game in any of the five matches.
“These matches that we’re playing right now that we’re heavily favored to win, we’re just trying to go in and not drop games and not get sloppy and be focused on what we need to do,” North coach Kendal Hammel said. “We did that, and that’s going to be our goal (today) — to lose as very minimal games as possible and make sure we’re doing what we’re supposed to and handle anything that comes at us.”
The Bull Dogs’s wins came from Nathan Lin against Sam Miller at No. 1 singles, Hank Lin over Caleb Wallace at No. 2 singles and Anvay Atram against Carson Rose at No. 3 singles. Matthew Liu and Amrit Kar beat Levi Gollmer and Eli Miller at No. 1 doubles, and Parth Shah and Austin Clark topped Hagen Wiedersatz and Alex Bower at No. 2 doubles.
“I think they did the absolute best they could,” Hauser coach Heather Miller said. “We haven’t seen serves with that kind of pace and the groundstrokes with that kind of pace all year. We’re a 1A school, and we don’t see that kind of competition.”
The Jets finished the season 8-7.
“I think we had a great season,” Heather Miller said. “It’s been awhile since we’ve had a winning season, so I feel really proud of the seniors. They competed well all year. We just need to replace a couple spots next year and hopefully keep the program going.”
