Portland High School Tennis Secures Regular Season League Title
Portland boy's tennis played Ionia Monday night in our second league match of the season. Tennis can be an interesting sport when it comes to expectations. We've won against Ionia pretty easily in the past and I think we have a very strong team this year. But it only takes one new and strong player in a line-up to change all of that around. Ionia showed some signs of having those players in this match. They have a very strong freshman class that is bringing some talent to their team. We ended up winning this one, but we had a few more struggles than in the past. This is going to be a tough team to beat in a couple of years. This brings us to 2-0 in our league matches with only Eaton Rapids left to play.
PORTLAND HIGH SCHOOL 7, IONIA HIGH SCHOOL 1
Singles
No. 1 - Aryan Virk, PORTLAND HIGH SCHOOL def. Jack Eppler, IONIA HIGH SCHOOL, 6-2, 6-1, -;
No. 2 - Jack Roe, PORTLAND HIGH SCHOOL def. Sam Eppler, IONIA HIGH SCHOOL, 6-1, 6-2, -;
No. 3 - Brett Longanbach, IONIA HIGH SCHOOL def. Ryan Leonard, PORTLAND HIGH SCHOOL, 6-2, 6-4, -;
No. 4 - Jorgen Sonday, PORTLAND HIGH SCHOOL def. Connor Hubaker, IONIA HIGH SCHOOL, 7-5, 6-3, -;
Doubles
No. 1 - Gabe Hankey - Marty Thelen, PORTLAND HIGH SCHOOL def. Nathan Morris - Collin Palmer, IONIA HIGH SCHOOL, 6-1, 6-0, -;
No. 2 - Kurt Kraczon - Alex Russman, PORTLAND HIGH SCHOOL def. Ethan Rowland - Ben Marhofer, IONIA HIGH SCHOOL, 6-0, 6-0, -;
No. 3 - Joe Lorenz - Cadin Cross, PORTLAND HIGH SCHOOL def. Brett Peterson - Miles Gregory, IONIA HIGH SCHOOL, 6-0, 6-1, -;
No. 4 - Kai Kipp - Casey Smith, PORTLAND HIGH SCHOOL def. Adam Bliss - Colter Clark, IONIA HIGH SCHOOL, 6-1, 6-1, -;
Portland Boy's Tennis clinched the regular season league title Wednesday night against Eaton Rapids. The overall title is decided half from the regular season results and half from the end of season tournament. We'll play that tournament in two weeks to see if we can win the whole thing. The boys played really well last night. However, the match of the night was at 1 singles. Aryan played a tough 3 set match that was decided by two games or less in each set. The Eaton Rapids player had a really tough serve and Aryan had to work hard to break it. He's grown a lot as a player since last season though. I'm not sure if he would have gotten this one last year. But this year he played smart shots, made his opponent work, and found a way to make it happen. He topped the night off by being named LSJ player of the week for his contributions in leading our team to the league title. The team now has a week and a half off before heading into the tournament time of the season. We'll play St Johns on Tuesday, October 1 to tune up for the league tourney.
PORTLAND HIGH SCHOOL 8, EATON RAPIDS SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL 0
Singles
No. 1 - Aryan Virk, PORTLAND HIGH SCHOOL def. Bronson Sysum, EATON RAPIDS SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL, 7-6 (2), 4-6, 6-4;
No. 2 - Jack Roe, PORTLAND HIGH SCHOOL def. Fonz Byrd, EATON RAPIDS SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL, 6-0, 6-4, -;
No. 3 - Ryan Leonard, PORTLAND HIGH SCHOOL def. Mason Phenix, EATON RAPIDS SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL, 6-2, 6-0, -;
No. 4 - Jorgen Sonday, PORTLAND HIGH SCHOOL def. Evan Grulke, EATON RAPIDS SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL, 6-2, 6-2, -;
Doubles
No. 1 - Gabe Hankey - Marty Thelen, PORTLAND HIGH SCHOOL def. Joe Babcock - Nathan Bauer, EATON RAPIDS SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL, 6-0, 6-0, -;
No. 2 - Kurt Kraczon - Alex Russman, PORTLAND HIGH SCHOOL def. Nolan Church - Caleb Haite, EATON RAPIDS SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL, 6-0, 6-0, -;
No. 3 - Joe Lorenz - Cadin Cross, PORTLAND HIGH SCHOOL def. Tyler Wolf - Lucas Preston, EATON RAPIDS SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL, 6-4, 6-2, -;
No. 4 - Kai Kipp - Casey Smith, PORTLAND HIGH SCHOOL def. Connor Woodcock - Jared Kesson, EATON RAPIDS SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL, 6-0, 6-3, -;
