Portland part 2

On President's day we wrapped up our swing through the Portland area with a 1pm match against Willamette (indoors). After playing a double header on Sunday in extremely cold weather and spending many hours in a bus the team was a bit stiff. However after a good warm-up the Whitties were ready for battle.

In an earlier post I mentioned the effects of graduating 7 seniors. Graduating that many good players could decimate at team. We were lucky to mitigate that effect by having strong player development and a talented freshman class (Andrew La Cava, Steven Roston, Will Husky and Atanas Atanasov). Something positive, however, has happened with the player graduation -- the current team has found its own voice. It appears that this year's team is about energy and passion. Honestly this might be the most vocal and energetic team I have coached. From top to bottom, from those playing to those watching, this team is absolutely committed to each other. I think playing the energized and vocal George Fox team Sunday awoke that voice.

On Sunday we played with the kind of energy and passion that is truly to awesome to watch. From the first point of doubles to the last point in singles the Whitman team played with incredible energy and love for each other. I know some will scoff at the term 'love,' but the chemistry on this team is special and the team support is overwhelming.

Willamette is one of the better teams in our conference and this year we only have the opportunity to play them once. Last year they finished 3rd in the conference but had a nice conference tournament where we faced them in the finals. This year they are a much better team: they return their talented top 4 players from last year and added two good players at 5 and 6. With a year of experience under their belts and two new players this is certainly a team to watch. Coach Toby Kraul has done great things for this program and they are certainly a program on the rise.

In doubles all three Willamette teams served first and all three were immediately broken. From that point on the Whitties were off to the races -- at #1 Andrew/Conor won 8-2, at #2 Jeff/ET won 8-2 and at #3 Matt/Quin won 8-0. I'm really impressed with the doubles results -- to play that well and post those scores against a good team is simply amazing.

We carried that momentum over to singles. At #1 Conor had a nice match winning 6-2, 6-1 over ITA finalist Cody Ferguson. Conor has to be pleased with this match since last year he narrowly defeated Ferguson in a match breaker. A few minutes later Jeff clinched the match at #4 with a 6-3, 6-0 victory. By the end of the Willamette match Jeff was flying around the court crushing every ball in site. At #6 Sam was down a break at 1-2 before winning 6-3, 6-0. At #5 I think Chris might of been down an early break but won 6-3, 6-1. Andrew was down 0-3 at #2 before getting a handle on nerves and posted a very good 6-4, 6-2 victory. Last match on was The Lion (ET) playing against a very talented Michael Baumgartner. Last year Baumgartner had an impressive freshman debut defeating three defeating NWC Players of the Year (including our own Matt Solomon). It was a very entertaining match to watch as both players were crushing the ball. In the end ET was a bit too much winning 6-4, 6-4. Great for the Whitman team to see ET start to regain his old form.

As a team we certainly rose to the occasion of an early season important conference match on the road. To sweep an improved Willamette team without losing a set (this might be the first time we have not lost a set to Willamette) certainly shows great team improvement and intensity.

We play our first home matches of the year this Saturday -- 1pm vs Lewis Clark and 5pm vs Linfield (#9 in the West Region).

Whitman 9 Willamette 0