SEYMOUR
Walking off the Seymour tennis courts Thursday night, Owls coach Brad Emerson made the comment, “I’ve never been 5-0.”
Emerson, in his 15th year as boys head tennis coach at SHS, saw his Owls improve to 5-0 for the first time with a 5-0 win over Jennings County.
It was Seymour’s second 5-0 victory of the season as the Owls also blanked Scottsburg.
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Emerson was proud of the way his team played. “It was a conference victory 5-0. I feel pretty good about it. The doubles came out better tonight, more focused.
“We’ve still got stuff to work on and I want to make sure that we’re ready for teams like Jeff, New Albany and some of the better teams that we are going to face, so I want to make sure these guys are at the top of their game.
“I got down on them a little bit for some of the mistakes they made, and made sure they’re aware of what they’re doing, and moving and being more aggressive.”
Emerson was pleased to see the doubles teams win in straight sets with Will Rinehart and Brandon Emerson winning 6-0, 6-1 over Jacob Vogel and Joe Kelly at No. 1, and Trey Hohenstreiter and Andrew Levine topped Alex Leach and Justin Ramey 6-2, 6-2 at No. 2.
Vincent Camboulas at No. 1 singles and Braden Handloser at No. 3 took care of business in straight sets. Camboulas topped Wyatt St. John 6-0, 6-0, while Handloser was a 6-3, 6-0 winner over Gage Gasper.
Isaac Hardin had to go overtime at No. 2 singles, beating Owen Cain 6-4, 6-4, 11-9 in a super tiebreaker.
“Isaac had a little bit of a hiccup in the first set. He was sleep-walking through it, then kind of woke up in the second and did well in the 10-point tiebreaker.in the third,” Emerson said. “I’m real happy for him. I told him early on that this was a conference match. He needed it if he wants to be considered for all-conference. I wanted to make sure he was aware of that so when we vote that I can have that backing me up.”
Emerson was pleased with the serving and ground-stroke play.
“We’re going to have a few double faults here-and-there. The wind played a factor, too. It was windy blowing from the south. Depending on which side you were on, you had to be a little careful. Hitting with the wind you had to put more spin on the ball, and if you flattened it out too much and got the ball up in the air it was going to go long, so spin was definitely they key in good serving tonight.”
The Owls will play host to Jeffersonville Tuesday.