Match Summaries – Week of 4/11/16 (Carlisle and MSA)
4/9/16 – Tennis journeyed down US-57 to the Carlisle School for the second match-up between the two teams this season as well as the Tiger’s inaugural clay court experience. As a team, Hargrave went down 2-7. Rakan Alshinibr (#6 singles) and the duo of Alex Yancy-David Kiesnowski (#3 singles) notched the two HMA victories. Once again at #1 singles, Wilson Pegram remained competitive in a grinding match with Carlisle Chief John Smith in a 90 minute duel.
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4/14/16 – Tiger Tennis Overcomes Mavericks of Miller
Tennis continued its road play with a trip up to the Miller School of Albemarle to enjoy the cool sunshine amid the scenic hills of Central Virginia. Building up the squad’s experience and confidence has been a continual work in progress and MSA match showed somie positive results and an HMA victory.
With MSA’s four courts, the team match split into 3 phases – singles ladder #1 through #4 that moved as soon as possible into completing the singles ladder and then playing out the doubles contests. In the first battery, Yee jumped out to a strong start and never looked back at #2 doubles. Kasica looked to be control at 5-2 before Maverick Hu made adjustments to stay in the match. Kasica was finally able to close out the match at 10-6 at #3 singles. Both Yancy and Pegram had trouble finding the service box and landing shots in protracted rallies. Yancy gamely kept on, but was never able to construct the right points at the right time. After a 2-3 start, he was stymied by Zhou until the match ended 2-10, Pegram was an interesting contrast. His low point found him at 1-5. After making some mental and mechanical adjustments, he took off on a run that first stunned and then kept his opponent unbalanced, taking 9 games in a row to finish the match off at 10-5.
With the team score 3-1, Ngabo and Alshinibr took over in their individual matches. Ngabo was unable to gain any momentum and was soon out of the competition, 1-10, against a steady Saunders. Alshinibr’s match outcome would not be determined until doubles play started. At that moment, the team score of 3-2 and Alshinibr’s confidence did not seem to supported by the close 3-2 score. But his confidence was well-founded and he ground out a 10-3 match score that belied a number of extended rallies and deuce games. Singles play ended with HMA 4, MSA 2.
Pegram and Yee were put together at #1 doubles and earned the Tiger victory 8-1. Kasica and Yancy coincidentally saw their singles opponents similarly partnered up, but their synergy made for a very different level of stress, posting a 8-2 victory at #2 doubles. With the light falling, the third doubles team of David Kiesnowski and Duc Nguyen (making his Varsity tennis debut) had their match shortened, but still victorious at 6-3. Cade Trahan and Ebrihim Al-Aghbari teamed in in exhibition play, putting in a solid match. Throughout the afternoon, good points were played and great efforts made by all the players on both sides.
Our next three contests will at Eastern Mennonite High School (4/26, Harrisonburg, VA), North Cross School (4/28, Roanoke, VA), and finally closing out the regular season with a home match against Blue Ridge School (5/3). Our seniors will be recognized at the 5/3 match.
Individual Match Scores:
Singles
#1 – Wilson Pegram v Enzo Berlender : 10-5
#2 – Mark Yee v Patrick Jin : 10-0
#3 – Walter Kasica v Martin Hu : 10-6
#4 – Alex Yancy v Jerry Zhou : 2-10
#5 – Armel Ngabo v. Corey Sanders : 1-10
#6 – Rakan Alshinibr v Jason Liu : 10-3
Doubles
#1 – Pegram and Yee v Berlender and Zhou : 8-1
#2 – Kasica and Yancy v Hu and Zhou : 4-8
#3 – David Kiesnowski and Duc Nguyen v Liu and Harrison Pollock : 6-3
Final Team Match Score: 7-2
