BOYS TENNIS: Berries top Kings in season opener
Aug. 17—WALTON — The Logansport boys tennis team has almost everybody back from last season and the Berries started strong with a 5-0 win over Lewis Cass on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, the Kings have just two starters back so it was a clean sweep to start the season for the Berries, although all five matches were competitive.
Dylan Pearson defeated Bryon Hurst 6-4, 6-2 at No. 1 singles. Cooper Smith defeated Nolan Hines 6-2, 6-2 at No. 2 singles. Conner Penz defeated Liam Ellington 6-4, 6-4 at No. 3 singles.
Aryan Patel and Blake Pearson defeated Bryce Rudd and Kyle Henry 6-3, 6-7 (5), 6-2 at No. 1 doubles. Max Kitchell and Aiden Swank defeated Riley Johnson and Drew Sailors 6-4, 6-3 at No. 2 doubles.
"We've lost to Cass the last couple years. It's been frustrating, so it was good to get a win and even better it was 5-0," Logansport coach Adam Thompson said. "We have a lot of big goals this season. We're going to have to play better than we did tonight though, a lot of things to tighten up and put ourselves in better positions and better situations. But I'm happy with our first match here being a win."
The Berries return their entire sectional lineup from a year ago except at No. 1 doubles, where freshman Blake Pearson was slotted in on Wednesday.
"We return most of the varsity. We had one senior quit to focus on running for track season, but Blake Pearson has stepped in as a freshman there and is playing 1 doubles right now. I think we're still going to be pretty good despite losing one senior," Thompson said.
The Berries finished 8-10 last season but played a 17-3 Twin Lakes team to within 3-2 in the sectional final.
Thompson said last season was a series of close calls but with what the Berries have coming back and with what their opponents are losing, things could turn around in a big way this year.
"Harrison in our conference lost their big guns. Most of the other schools in the conference graduated significant pieces of the varsity. We did not graduate significant pieces of the varsity," Thompson said. "We lost a lot of matches 2-3 last season against sectional opponents and conference opponents, and even in our regional, Carmel's not in our regional anymore. The best teams in our regional are West Lafayette and Harrison and those schools. That's within the realm of possibility now as where before it was not something that you looked as a possibility with Carmel being there. But we need to get better to put ourselves in the position to accomplish these things."
Logansport is competing in the NCC for the final season this year and is seeking its first conference championship in boys tennis since 1958. Harrison was state runner-up to Indianapolis North Central last year with a 3-2 loss but graduates every spot except No. 1 doubles.
Thompson thinks this year's Logansport team has a chance at its lofty goals despite having a roster where the majority of its players prioritize baseball during the summer.
"Tennis is nobody's priority except for mine," Thompson said. "I try to get as much time out of them as I can out of the summer knowing that guys at Kokomo, guys at Harrison, guys at McCutcheon, those guys are playing through the winter, they're playing through the spring, they're playing through the summer and we aren't. So we've got to make sure that we improve during the season every day and every week."
The Kings had a strong team last year that would have had a shot at winning the Logansport Sectional but they were moved to the Peru Sectional because Maconaquah didn't field a team last year.
Cass was one of the three teams to beat Twin Lakes during the regular season, the others being Harrison and Peru. The Kings lost to an 18-5 Peru team 5-0 in a sectional match.
The Kings went 11-5 last year but graduated five of their seven starters. They return just Hurst and Hines.
They will be back competing in the Logan Sectional this year but opened with a loss to the Berries.
"It's the first match. You always expect to work out some of the kinks that you've got to do," Cass coach Matt Hurst said. "We've got kids playing in positions they haven't played before. I saw a lot of good things and that's what we build for the rest of the season. I'm proud of the guys still.
"Our 1 singles was a doubles player for three years so he's having to do something different. But everyone is stepping up and everyone did some good things, got things to learn and now we know what we're doing in practice."
Hurst is looking forward to the move to the Three Rivers Conference this season.
"We're playing teams we haven't played before, so it'll be fun," he said. "At least I don't have to do the conference tourney up at Twin Lakes for three nights. I'll take it. But yeah, it'll be interesting. A lot of these teams we've never faced, we've never seen, so it'll make it a little exciting this year I think, something new, something fresh."
