Patriots earn 1st win of '08 (08/26/2008)

After a difficult opening week, a quick win was just what the Patriots needed.

Union City provided it Monday night as Jay County High School's boys tennis team lost just seven games in a 5-0 trouncing of the visiting Indians.

"We really have a lot more smiles out of the 15 guys out here tonight. That's nice to see," said JCHS coach Barry Weaver, whose team lost 5-0 to both Marion and Norwell last week and then finished last out of eight teams at Saturday's DeKalb Invitational. "They all want to play well. They want to get over the hump and get some good, positive results. They're going that way finally."

Union City provided little resistance to the Patriot line-up, especially when the home team was able to put its first serves in play.

Senior Kyle Simmons displayed that pattern in his final game at No. 2 singles.

After Simmons fell behind love-15, the Indians' Danny Lamm failed to get any of his next four serves back across the net. He shanked two of the attempts into the net, smacked another wide right and couldn't get a racket on the fourth as Simmons closed the match with an ace.

The victory pushed Simmons, who went 2-1 at DeKalb, to 3-3 on the year.

"He was really struggling with the idea of topspin," said Weaver of Simmons' opening week.

"Over the weekend it started to develop a little bit more. It's just getting back into it and getting back to basics. ...Those things are starting to come back to them."

Phil Powell and Adam Horn, both seniors, also rolled to shutout wins in their opening sets at No. 1 and No. 3 singles respectively.

Powell used a big serve to close out the first set, and then gave up just one game in the second as he picked up his first win of the year 6-0, 6-1 over Ian Armstrong. Horn (2-4) fought off a break point opportunity for Union City's Adam Barga in the sixth game of the opening set and rolled to a 6-0, 6-2 victory.

"It was one of those things where we were more relaxed because we knew the opponent wasn't gong to do some things that we weren't used to," said Weaver. "It's just a matter of playing your game.

"Phil hit the ball solid tonight ... It's there, it's just a matter of reminding yourself to do those things."

At No. 1 doubles, Jared Valentine and Chase Wellman dropped the opening game before finding their groove. They won the next 12 in a row, closing out the first set thanks to three consecutive double faults by the Indians, for a 6-1, 6-0 victory over Jordan Loesch and Levi Thornburg.

Sam Miller and Tylor Smith, both newcomers to tennis, picked up their first career victory at No. 2 doubles. They teamed to top Aurelio Terriques and Douglas Spurling 6-1, 6-2.

"They're guys who haven't played much tennis," said Weaver of Miller and Smith. "To see them starting to ... figure out some things as far as how to move on the court and how to help each other (is good)."

Junior varsity

Jay County picked up a pair of wins, with Brad Leuthold knocking off Derrick Garland 8-3 at No. 2 singles.

Jordan McBride won the No. 1 singles match 8-4 over Brandon Mendenhall.[[In-content Ad]]