All good things must come to end and unfortunately for us it ended a bit too early. On Saturday we were defeated by a very competitive UW - Whitewater team 5-2. We knew going into the match we were going to have a tough match. Unfortunately the match was a bit too competitive and the Whitewater team took an early lead and never looked back.
Over the weekend the weather in St Louis was cold and rainy forcing indoor play. Even though we have plenty of experience playing indoors, I think the move was more a benefit to the big serving Whitewater team. In doubles they were able to control the momentum of the matches with big serves and returns. At #1 doubles Andrew/Conor lost to one of the top teams in the central region 8-5. As a side note the Whitewater duo will be playing in the NCAA doubles championship next week. At #2 doubles ET/Jeff played their usual solid doubles to tie the match at 1-1. At #3 doubles we were broke in the 3rd game of the match and the Whitewater team served their way to an 8-6 win (they were never broken).
Going into singles we were down 1-2 but still full of confidence. The previous weekend we were down 1-2 against LCSC and managed to come back and win 5 of the singles.
In singles we had a great team battle. Early on each team raced out to a lead in 3 of the singles. Whitewater won the 1st sets at #1, #4, and #5 while we won the 1st set at #2, #3, and #6. Unfortunately this really backed us into a corner knowing we needed to take 4 of the singles to win the match. Whitewater got on the singles board first winning at #1 and #4 putting them up 4-1. At #6 Adriel got us back into the match with a 6-0, 6-4 win. While ET was close to a victory (6-3, 5-4), Whitewater took #5 singles off a ball that hit the net cord and dribbled over for a winner. Tough way to lose an individual and team match -- dribbling ball off the net cord.
Such a tough ending for our season. We went into the match prepared but didn't play our best tennis. One thing I really appreciated during the match was how hard everyone competed. Everyone put forth an amazing effort. The Whitewater team simply played better tennis and had just enough to gain the victory.
Even in defeat the weekend was a great finish to our season. We earned a trip to ST Louis as the #2 seed in the Midwest bracket (Whitewater was the #3 seed). We had a great time being together and had time to reflect on the amazing journey we had all been apart of. The negative part of the trip (besides the loss) was it took place right in the middle of finals week. Everyone was busy studying and taking tests.
The trip was a great learning experience for the team. Even though we lose three important members of the team to graduation (Chris, Etienne and Quin) we are already thinking about what we need to do to get ready for next season. Even after a long season our eyes are now turned to training over the summer and getting ready for the fall season.
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