Falcons are favorites

Defending champion Northeastern’s move out of the Jay County High School boys tennis sectional left a void at the top.
The Golden Falcons have filled that spot.
Winchester claimed the title of sectional favorite Thursday as it defeated the host Jay County Patriots 5-0.
 “If that was a good indication of the way sectional is going to be, then we’ve got some things we’ve got to get accomplished obviously,” said JCHS coach Barry Weaver, whose team’s last sectional title came in the tournament at Marion in 2007. “At this point, I think when we get to those positions where it’s deuce or where it’s near the end of a game we just have to come up with the big points.
“It’s like the third downs or the fourth downs in football. It’s like the free throws in basketball. It’s knowing when the pressure is on and being able to step up …”
The teams will return to JCHS along with Union City and Randolph Southern for sectional action in less than two weeks.
“I think they did real well, even better than what I was expecting,” said Winchester coach Dennis Streeter of his Falcons. “We really stepped up. Winning 5-0, how can you complain on that one?
“I hope we can do it one more time when we see them in the sectional.”
Winchester (10-3), which lost last season’s championship match 5-0 to Northeastern and has never won a crown, dominated in doubles action Thursday.
The Golden Falcons turned in shutout victories in the first sets at No. 1 doubles and No. 2 doubles.
Winchester’s senior duo of Jack Roberts and Gavin Cox used experience to their advantage, moving Patriots Josh Lykins and Zach Pryor around the court and hitting winners in the gaps all night. They closed out the opening set with an overhead slam and went on to defeat Lykins and Pryor 6-0, 6-2.
The No. 2 doubles match finished with the same score as Jake Schwieterman and Evan Mathias fell to Marcus Melton and Isaiah Davis.
“Without having that (experience) under your belt it’s difficult to be able to come up with those angles and the idea of how to cover the court,” said Weaver. “Even though we talk about them and we go through them, when you’re out there (it’s hard) … They both got out-experienced.
“Our No. 2 doubles tonight, it just wasn’t their night. They hit a lot of shots that I haven’t seen them hit for four or five weeks now. … It was just one of those nights.”
Jay County’s Josh Martin dropped the first three games to Jalen Cox at No. 2 singles. He was unable to recover in a 6-2, 6-1 loss.
“He had a kid that hit everything slice,” said Weaver of Martin. “He was having a hard time with the backspin going away from him. … And the kid had a lot of control with that backspin.”
Garhett Blackford had the lead for Jay County early in his match at No. 3 singles as he took a 2-1 advantage over Avery Walker. But he dropped five of the next six games on the way to a 6-3, 6-3 defeat.
Landry Inman and Winchester’s Dustin Detro were evenly matched at No. 1 singles, trading games back-and-forth on the way to a first-set tiebreaker. Inman hit shots into the net on each of the first two points and sent one wide left on the third to fall behind 3-0 on the way to dropping the tiebreaker.
In the second set, Detro broke Inman to grab a 5-3 lead only to have Inman break back and win five straight games to go up 6-5. Once again Detro evened the score to force a tiebreaker.
They were tied at three, four, five, six, seven and eight in the tiebreaker before Detro finally picked up back-to-back points to earn a 7-6 (7-3), 7-6 (10-8) victory.
“(Detro) just didn’t give up, and (Inman) didn’t either,” said Streeter. “We just had a couple of shots better than they did at the right time.”[[In-content Ad]]