BROWNSTOWN
Brownstown Central boys tennis team rebounded from a road loss Monday to defeat sectional rival Trinity Lutheran 4-1 on the BCHS courts Tuesday afternoon.
Braves coach Mitchell Taylor said that while it was nice to win, he felt his team could have performed better in some positions.
“I’m glad we came out and won,” Taylor said. “I think at different positions we could be playing a lot better. I’ve told my guys who bring an idea basis and who needs to start doing that and follow suit. I think we kind of hit a little bump in the road with our loss at Borden."
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Taylor credited Borden’s play but felt his team didn’t step up to the challenge.
“Borden is a very good team, but I think when it comes to competing against a team like Borden we just didn’t step up to the plate at all," he continued. "We kind of got complacent. I’m not really happy where we’re at as a team. There are points in the season that we’ve played really well. It’s just got to become consistent, and we’ve got time to do that.”
He was pleased with the efforts of Ethan Isaacs at No. 1 and Ethan Davis at No. 2 singles. Isaacs topped Jace Crockett 6-0, 6-0, and Davis was a 6-0, 6-1 winner over Jerry Liang.
“I think our one and two singles, Ethan Isaacs and Ethan Davis, really set the tone for our team as far as just what it takes to win tennis matches," Taylor said. "Those two guys were playing JV last year. They just started playing tennis last year.
“I haven’t coached that long, but they’re two guys I’ve seen improve more than anybody else. That’s a credit to them. As they lead by example, I just hope our other guys learn and just really find an area where they can focus on and get better at and hopefully help them play more consistently for the rest of the year.”
In spite of the loss, Trinity coach Bailey Baker saw some positive things.
“(Crockett and Liang) both played pretty good. I just feel like they got off to a slow start as usual," Baker said. "Jerry could use improvement in hitting more mixed up shots. He just wants to hit it consistently back to the middle over and over. We’ve got to work on him hitting some winning shots.”
Noah Voelker picked up the Cougars’ lone point with a 6-2, 6-3 win over Kelian East at No. 3 singles.
“Noah played really well today," Baker said. "He played probably played his best match. He improved everywhere, really. He was doing a good mixture of chop shots and ground strokes, and his serves were good and he was placing the ball where it needed to be and stuff like that.
“He’ll definitely move up the line up if he keeps playing like that.”
The Braves (9-3) swept doubles with Reece Carlin and Griffin Stidam winning 6-3, 6-4 over Jack VonDielingen, and Cole Shasteen and Trent Luedeman topped Luke Pollert and Henry Hall 6-3, 6-2 at two doubles.
"Our doubles guys need to be more aggressive at the net, and just more focused and prepared how they play point-to-point," Taylor said. "A lot of them like to watch balls after they hit go in before they’re preparing for the next point, and we’ve talked about it all year. You watch the pros, those guys move. The number of steps they take in a match is ridiculous. I just try to instill getting their feet ready, have their racquet ready as much as possible and these guys haven’t realized how much that effects the mistakes they make.”
Baker felt his doubles teams gave a good effort.
“The second doubles had a new combination for this match so it was a little different. I felt like they were just not fully focused on the match. The first doubles played really good. One player was playing with a racquet he has never played with before, which I don’t suggest, but I didn’t know until about half-way through.
“One doubles was playing really well today. I just wish they would have come out a little bit earlier.”
The Cougars (2-11) will host Henryville today, and the Braves will host Eastern Thursday.