PLYMOUTH — It was opening night with its accompanying jitters but Plymouth tennis coach Michael Delp was still upbeat despite a 3-2 loss to Kokomo n Monday night.
“Not having a senior with the experience that Tommy (Holloway) has is tough,” said Delp. “Our guys played well at all three singles spots and I don’t want to take anything away from what Kokomo did, I just really don’t think they saw our best tonight. I think it was really a case of nerves across the board. Our inexperience showed.”
Holloway will be available to the team later in the week, not having reached the IHSAA minimum practice requirement, while several Pilgrims were out with illness Monday making the Pilgrims depth a little shallow for opening night. Even at that, the Pilgrims had positives to walk away with.
Plymouth dropped all three singles matches with Mitch Rose falling to Kokomo’s Nate Hemmerich 6-0, 6-0, Andy Rostron falling to Daniel Sorias Florit 6-0, 6-1 and Dylan Voreis falling to Jon Callane 6-2 6-4.
“Early on. if we could have gotten a couple of games under our belt we could have calmed down and played a little better, but you don’t get a re-do,” said Delp. “We had no seniors in the lineup tonight — four sophomores in there. That being said I saw some very big positives on all the courts.
“Dylan (Voreis at three singles) did a really good job of staying under control which is what we asked him to do. He tried to execute a plan and what you are running into, especially on the singles courts is guys with a lot of experience and part of the process is learning to beat guys like that.”
The Pilgrims were able to sweep with Clay Hilliard and Adam Hunter taking the number one match by a 7-5, 6-1 final and Bo Meadors and Shaun Frantz winning at number two by a 6-2 6-2 count.
“We did look good in our doubles matches,” said Delp. “They know how we want to play and they went out and executed. At number one what was really positive with Clay (Hilliard) and Adam (Hunter) was that they were down 5-4 and came back to win the next three in a row and that’s a feather in the cap. They took care of business in the second set.”
While the loss is tough, Delp knows that with a long week of matches (Elkhart Central Tuesday, at Wawasee Thursday, then Munster and Fort Wayne Carroll come to Plymouth Saturday) his squad will have a chance to find out where they stand.
“The nice thing is that we do have some interchangeable parts,” said Delp. “We go seven or eight deep right now and they are going to have to compete everyday to keep their spot. That’s a positive thing. Guys know if they keep playing well and stay with it they have a chance to jump up into a varsity spot.”
“There are a lot of different directions we can go with our lineup,” he said. “I can about guarantee that we will look back on this match at the end of the year and say we are a lot better.”
The Pilgrims have Elkhart Central at the Hunter Tennis Complex for a 5 p.m. start Tuesday.
Scores:
Singles
One – Nate Hemmerich (K) over Mitch Rose 6-0, 6-0.
Two – Daniel Sorias Florit (K) over Andy Rostron 6-0, 6-1.
Three – Jon Callane (K) over Dylan Voreis 6-2 6-4.
Doubles
No. One – Clay Hilliard/Adam Hunter (P) over Payton McClain/Jackson Richards 7-5, 6-1.
No. Two – Bo Meadors/Shaun Frantz (P) over Lucas Hubbard/Kyle Hughes 6-2, 6-2.
JV
Singles
Cooper Reed (K) over Tanner Medina 4-1 4-3 (7-5).
Conner Duncan (K) over Matthew Gerard 4-3 (10-8) 4-2.
Austin Kizerey (P) over Drew Swain 4-3 (11-9), 4-1.
Kyle Cox (P) over Drew Swain 4-2.
Doubles
Hugh Smith/Drew Harrell (P) over Andrew Purvis/Brett Lytle 4-0, 4-1.
