Patriots come up short vs. Giants

Crosby Heniser fired a serve down the middle of the court to help him steal the first game against Vikram Oddiraju.

As they went to switch sides, it didn’t matter that Heniser had just gotten game one out of the way. He already had a solid idea of his opponent’s ability.

“That kid is good,” he said as they switched sides.

Heniser wasn’t able to steal another game from Oddiraju, but that wasn’t a result of a lack of effort.

Heniser, a sophomore, made Oddiraju work for each point Thursday, but eventually lost his No. 1 singles match as the Jay County High School boys tennis team fell to the Marion Giants 5-0 in its home opener.

“You can always be disappointed with a loss,” said JCHS coach Scott Miller, whose team fell to 3-2 on the season. “The guys are going to be frustrated. They are going to come off the court feeling defeated just because you lose.

“From my standpoint, as a coach, I am looking more into how they’re growing in the match, how they’re playing against a skilled opponent that can play at a higher level and try to bring their level up so they improve.”

No Patriot showed that fight more than Hensier on Thursday night. In spite of knowing he was overmatched, Hensier battled Oddiraju to deuce three times in the opening game and didn’t allow the Giant to break his serve.

Throughout the rest of the match, Heniser fired back at Oddiraju each chance he got, often sprinting from one side of the court to the other, firing a mix of backhanded shots and forehand attacks. Occasionally, Heniser attempted drop shots too.

In the end, though, he wasn’t able to string together enough points after that opening game.

“(Oddiraju) is fantastic,” Miller said. “He is a very good tennis player … but what was fun for me to watch is Crosby hung in there every single point. He played every single point like it was the only point that mattered.

“He played hard. He had some great shots. He won some great points … He’s only a sophomore (so) for him to have an opportunity to play against a kid like that is great.”

Just behind Heniser’s effort was that of Jay County’s No. 2 doubles team of Frankie Crump and Darius Esparza. The duo lost the opening set to Tristan Galeon and Nihal Nagesh 6-0 but didn’t go down quietly. After dropping the first four games of the second set, Crump and Esparza alternated games and trailed 5-2.

With Crump serving, the Patriot pair won the eighth game and trimmed the margin to 5-3. The late rally fell short, as Galeon and Nagesh put the match away in the ninth game.

“The mentality of this team right now is just play (and) play hard,” Miller said. “Losing is not fun. No one likes to do it. It doesn’t matter who your opponent is across the net from you, they want to win and that’s been evident all year long.”

Christian Romero, Jay County’s No. 2 singles player, lost to Noah Lyons 6-1, 6-0, and Simon Dirksen fell 6-0, 6-0 at No. 3 singles to Jack Fauser.

The Patriots’ No. 1 doubles team of Sheldon Upp and Gavin Myers came up short against Cole Maddon and Caleb Spitzer 6-0, 6-1.

He was disappointed with the loss, but Miller was also grateful for the learning experience his team gained from the shutout loss to the Giants.

“When they come off the court after a loss like this, when we’re having our conversations they’re talking about what they need to be doing in practice, what they want to work on in practice, what we need to do differently so that they can improve and from my point of view that is fantastic,” he said. “When you have 12 freshmen and sophomores on your team that’s fantastic because we have a lot of room to grow and we have time.”