Menomonie, Memorial have strong showings in tennis subsectionals
Division 1 boys tennis subsectionals got underway Monday and the top three teams in the Big Rivers Conference made up the top three team scores in the Eau Claire Memorial subsectional.
Menomonie, who snapped the Old Abes streak of winning every Big Rivers title since 1997 this season, finished the day in the lead with 22 points. Memorial wasn’t far behind with 18 and Hudson came in third with 16.
The Mustangs advanced players to the sectional round in six of the seven flights and the Old Abes will have five players competing at sectionals. Both Menomonie and Memorial had players reach the semifinals in singles flight one with Menomonie’s Isaac Johnson and Memorial’s Gavin Sorensen advancing.
Eau Claire North’s Logan Carroll and Hudson’s Luke Deschene also advanced in singles flight one. Memorial’s Evan Birkholz and Hudson’s Nate Anderson were the subsectional finalists in singles flight two.
In doubles competition, the four teams moving to sectionals from flight one are Henry Whipkey and Sam Majerus from River Falls, Menomonie’s Noah Reckin and Brady Goodman, Henry Fesenmaier and Will Nordstrom for the Old Abes and Henry Mechelke and Noah Brueske from Hudson.
Flight two saw Menomonie’s Charlie Behrend and Micah Gunderson and New Richmond’s Isaac Noll and Luke Mews advance.
Teams from the Memorial subsectional will taken on teams from the Rhinelander subsectional in the sectional round on Wednesday at the Menard YMCA Tennis Center.
Menomonie is tied with DC Everest atop the sectional leaderboard with 22 points, Stevens Point is at 20 and Rhinelander is at 18. Per the WIAA tournament procedure, the sectional team champion will be the only team advancing to team state.
Individually, the top four finishers in flight one and the top finisher in flight two in both doubles and singles competition will advance to state. 16 other singles and doubles platers eliminated earlier in the tournament will be selected by the State Seeding Committee with one being chosen from each sectional.
Altoona and Regis neck and neck in subsectional
In Division 2 subsectional play on Tuesday, it was Altoona and Regis show at the Altoona subsectional as the Rails and Ramblers were well ahead of the pack in team standings and were near perfect in advancing teams to sectionals.
Altoona actually advanced players in every flight to sectionals while Regis will only be absent in flight three singles competition. Altoona has 24 points going into sectionals with Regis right on its heels at 22. Third place at the Altoona subsectional were Lakeland Union and Medford at 12 each.
Altoona’s Ryan Hays and Regis’ Tony Wesner each made the semifinals in singles flight one, sending them both to sectionals. Trenton Navarre for the Rails and the Ramblers Eli Smith made up the top two in singles flight two.
Among the four teams advancing in the doubles top flight were Altoona’s Tegan Bennett and Jaxton Semrow as well as Regis’ Andrew Berschback and Ty Gehling. Daylen Parks and Lucas Pederson from Altoona as well as Nash Cullinan and Jack Schroeder from Regis were the flight two qualifiers.
Both Altoona and Regis will compete with teams from the Aquinas subsectional. Aquinas is behind Altoona and Regis with 20 points. La Crosse Logan has 18. No other team has more than 12.
The Regis sectional will take place Thursday. Qualifying for the state tournaments is the same as Division 1 with the exception being that only eight additional players are selected in the individual tournament.
Full results can be found at tennisreporting.com.
