- April 19, 2024
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The tournament's condensed schedule was a challenge, as well as an opportunity, for local high school teams.
BY MATT MENCARINI | SPORTS EDITOR
The district tennis tournament brings excitement, opportunity and, of course, pressure.
“You get one shot, so it’s do or die,” Seabreeze boys coach Robert Holtgrewe said. “(It’s) single elimination, so there’s a lot of nervousness to start with. (But for) most of the players, once they get going, the nervousness kind of eases away.”
The district tournament, held at Daytona Beach's Florida Tennis Center, began Monday and was scheduled through Wednesday. It determines which teams and individuals advance to regionals.
And experience can make the first few days of the tournament more productive. The quicker players are able to adjust, the better their position will be moving forward.
“My seniors are used to it,” said Seabreeze girls coach Jacklyn Gion. “For my younger players, it’s a lot. Even though they did have (the) Five Star (tournament) a few weeks ago, it’s different with districts.”
Seabreeze’s Lindsay Brock, who was named captain during the season, and Kendall Hawthorne are two seniors from which Gion said she expects big things. They’ve grown to thrive in the condensed tournament schedule, she said, when it's not abnormal to have a doubles match immediately following a singles.
“We have a lot of weeks where we’ll play three matches,” Mainland boys coach Patrick Monahan said. “They’re usually not back-to-back-to-back, but (our guys) are used to playing two matches in a day and six matches in a week.”
Before the week got going, and eliminations started getting tallied, there was optimism among some Seabreeze and Mainland teams.
“I think we can contend for winning, as a team,” Monahan said Tuesday. “We got a pretty good draw, so I like our chances.”
Among the individual players Monahan expects to perform well is Todd Arias, who was seeded No. 1 in his flight.
“We try not to think too far ahead,” Monahan said. “We focus on the opponent we’re playing and then, if we win, we’ll worry about the next guy.”
But for Holtgrewe, he just wants to see his team play well, and continue to improve as he said they had throughout the season, when expectations were somewhat low.
“We’re kind of in a rebuilding year,” he said. “I think we’ve improved as the year has gone through, and we won three out of the four singles matches (Monday).”
