Tiger Tennis fall to LCA Flames, L 2-7

Men of the Match – Nabeel Barqawi and Michael Liu

Some tennis players happily dominate. Others are known for their grim determination. In today’s match, we saw a third option… players that quietly and happily refuse to go down against opponents equally determined not to quit. In a team filled with young men that could fit that description, two Tiger standouts appeared in the match against the LCA flames.

Tian Hao “Michael” Liu, playing with a strained wrist and a spring cold, took his match to 10-10 against an opponent similarly suffering through a minor back injury. Very few of the games did not go to deuce and players alternatively held and broke serve. The 21st game ended in the favor of opponent Dave Kang, but both players hadn’t left anything on the shelf. Gracious exchanges characterized the long rallies that demonstrated a steady patience and an all-court game that is often unseen at this level of play.

In two contests that ended up in favor of the Tigers, Nabeel Barqawi was able to rein in his sometimes overly aggressive approach to the ball to work through a victory against an equally determined Noah Midkiff, finally putting up a final score of 10-6 at #5 singles. He then paired up with southpaw Turner Wall where they jumped to a 6-2 lead before getting into an exchange of games to post the second Hargrave win with a score of 8-6. At doubles Wall and Barqawi have been a very successful team, currently at 3-0 for this season.

Match Results against LCA, 4/13/12. Match scores follow the L or W in the parenthesis.

#1 Singles – Yiwen Zhang v C. Good (L 2-10)
#2 Singles – Frankie Chang v M. Henderson (L 1-10)
#3 Singles – Turner Wall v S. Yates (L 1-10)
#4 Singles – Michael Liu v D. Kang (L 10-11 (3-7))
#5 Singles – Nabeel Barqawi v N. Midkiff (W 10-6)
#6 Singles – Wei An Chen v J. Drane (L 3-10)
#1 Doubles – Chang/Liu v Good/Yates (L 4-8)
#2 Doubles – Zheng/Hu v Henderson/Dunbar (L 3-8)
#3 Doubles – Barqawi/Wall v Midkiff/Drane (W 8-6)
Exhibition Play
Tudela, Hu, Wei Ann Chen played exhibition singles
Hargrave Military Academy logo.