Hazelwood West Tennis Keeps First Place with Team Win against McCluer North

FLORISSANT – The varsity boys tennis team maintained its grip to its first place position in the Suburban North Conference standings on Wednesday, April 13, with a 5-2 team win against host McCluer North.

The Wildcats (5-1), who’ve only lost one team meet all season, have defeated all three league opponents they’ve faced, winning each meet in increasingly impressive fashion.

West split the four singles matches with McCluer North, but was able to claim the meet victory by dominating the doubles competition.

The Wildcat doubles teams of Alex Davis and Ethan Engel (No. 1 team), Josh Sutter and Nick Ehlers (No. 2), and Brenden Wicks and Kameron Mitchell (No. 3) each pulled out three-set wins against the three McCluer North teams, giving West a 3-0 edge in the team meet scoring.

For records sake, Davis and Engel defeated McCluer North’s top team of Dan Cerny and Ben Burnett by the score of 6-4, 4-6, 6-2, and Sutter and Ehlers knocked off North’s  No. 2 team of James Bean and Connor Clasby 6-3, 2-6, 6-2.

But the most thrilling doubles victory for the Wildcats came in the No. 3 doubles match between Wicks and Mitchell and North’s Wesley Cox and Matt Graham.

Cox and Graham won a spirited first set against the West team 6-4.  But Wicks and Mitchell stormed back, taking the second set 6-3, then convincingly winning the final set 6-2.

Wednesday’s doubles match sweep for the Wildcats was the fourth time this season they’ve won all three doubles matches at a particular team meet.

In the singles matches, West’s No. 1 singles player Luke Hanson, and No. 3 player Myles Xanh lost a difficult matches to North No. 1 Joshua Papes and No. 3 Tommy Ferguson.

Both matches were straight set wins for the Stars by scores of 6-3, 7-5.

West’s Brenden Rowberry moved his individual season record to 6-0, with a 2-6, 6-3, 6-3 comeback win against North’s Leon Smallwood.

Rowberry is the only Wildcat tennis player with an unblemished record this season, and had to battle hard against the ultra-quick Smallwood to stay that way, especially after losing the first set.

West’s Corey Richards earned what was probably the most surprising victory of the day against North’s Carlton Poindexter in the No. 2 singles match.

Richards winning the match wasn’t so much the surprise. He and Poindexter were a pretty evenly matched pairing.

The surprise was the manor in which Richards won, simply blowing Poindexter right off the court with a straight set 6-1, 6-3 win.

West’s next Suburban North Conference meet will be next Wednesday, April 20, when the Wildcats will host rival Hazelwood Central at the Wildcat tennis courts.

That meet is slated to start at 4 p.m.