Hornets Open Tennis Season By Taking 2nd at Pioneer

The Saline Hornets boys’ tennis team started their 2011 season off at the Ann Arbor Pioneer Quad. The team finished second behind the Port Huron Huskies. Pioneer and Holly came in third and fourth, respectively.

“[The team] did a good job of keeping after it. Win or lose, they competed very well,” said head coach Andrew BeDell.

Each Hornet played three matches during the tournament. Of the 24 matches, Saline won 12.

In singles play, Blake Ahadi lost his first match (6-3) (7-5) and his second (6-2) (6-0), but rebounded to win his third match (6-1) (6-1).  David Zick, who took second in his flight, won his first match (6-0) (6-0), but lost his next match (6-1) (6-4). He won his final match (6-3) (6-2). Will Heider won his opening match (6-0) (6-1), but dropped his final two matches (7-5) (6-1) and (7-5) (6-0). Karl Winsor won his flight by winning all three of his matches. He won (6-0) (6-1), (6-1) (7-5) and (6-2) (6-1).

In doubles, Spencer Kennedy and Donovan Main led the way, taking second in their flight by winning their first two matches (6-3) (6-0) and (6-0) (6-1), but dropped their final match (6-4) (6-2). Matthew Geiger and Sham Shah won their opening match (6-0) (6-2), but lost their final two matches in three sets (4-6) (6-1) (6-4) and (3-6) (6-2) (6-2). Mitch Manninen and Noah Skochelak lost a close match to Port Huron to open their day (7-6) (7-5) and lost (6-1) (6-2) in their middle match, but rallied to win their final match in three sets (5-7) (6-4) (6-2). Ryan Marcus and Kenny Viera lost to Pioneer (6-3) (6-4), but won their middle match (7-5) (6-2). They dropped their final match (6-3) (6-0).

“We did some good stuff, but we had some matches we should have won. We had some leads we should have taken advantage of. I think it is a good place to start, from a competitive side. It was a good test early in the year,” said BeDell.

The Hornets host Dexter on Monday, Aug. 22.