By Bruce Karnick

[email protected]

The Raider boys tennis team started the season 14 with a tough loss to a top ranked Tartan team, a 43 win against Park of Cottage Grove on April 13 and three difficult, but experience producing matches at the Eagan tournament.

“We played a couple of top 10 ranked teams and singles players there too. It was definitely a tough tournament. It was good though, from the standpoint that we brought a lot of young guys because we had a few of our normal varsity guys that couldn't make it, so some ninth graders got to go and get something to kind of aspire to in the sense of just seeing that high level tennis,” explained head coach Alex Zuzek.

The experience of the tournament paid off when the Raiders took on the Packers of South St. Paul. The boys were playing with confidence and making quick decisions despite the relatively young rosters for Hastings.

“I'm looking at what we've been talking a lot about with the guys, communication with both Marissa and I as coaches but then also especially with their teammates,” Zuzek said. “Giving a cheer here to each other, talking to their doubles partners, different things like that for communication, and that commitment towards getting better. Applying coaching and everything, that has been our main focus so far. We have a lot of guys that are young and a lot of guys that are pretty new. We have around 25 on the roster, out of that I think 17 or 18 are freshmen or sophomores.”

Against South St. Paul on April 19, Zuzek mixed up the doubles teams to pair a senior or junior with a younger player to help them build that communication piece as well as teach them the strategies and positioning of doubles versus singles matches.

Practice this season has been tough with all the rainouts and cold days, forcing the boys inside. Thankfully, the field house is set up for a few tennis courts as needed. The tough part with that is the various lines that are painted on the floor for the various sports. One advantage of the field house is the quick, smooth surface. The surface helps the boys adjust to other fast surfaces in the conference and also trains them to look for the differences in the surfaces during warmups.

Overall, Zuzek is happy with the progress made so far by the team and he is focused on making steady, measurable improvements before sections.

Here are the result for both the Park and South St. Paul Matches.

South St. Paul 3, Hastings 4, Singles: No. 1 Brady Zak, Hastings def. Joseph Rossow, South St. Paul, 60 , 60 , ; No. 2 Michael Johnson, Hastings def. Zachary Molumby, South St. Paul, 64 , 64 , ; No. 3 Daniel Everson, South St. Paul def. Brady Teegarden, Hastings, 63 , 62 , ; No. 4 Trenton Smith, South St. Paul def. Quinton Heiman, Hastings, 63 , 63 , ; Doubles: No. 1 Henry Ascheman Devon Yang, Hastings def. Evan Sanford Caleb Weiberg, South St. Paul, 63 , 61 , ; No. 2 Caleb Teegarden Charlie Jensen, Hastings def. Anton Gogala Matthew Elsner, South St. Paul, 46 , 61 , 62 ; No. 3 Noah Oeffling Travis Elsner, South St. Paul def. Matt Darst Maddox Repke, Hastings, 75 , 46 , 63 ; Park 3, Hastings 4, Singles: No. 1 Brady Zak, Hastings def. Caleb Swigart, Park , 76 , 62 , ; No. 2 Michael Johnson, Hastings def. Noah Holmgren, Park , 63 , 60 , ; No. 3 Oliver Cox, Park def. Brady Teegarden, Hastings, 61 , 64 , ; No. 4 Tyler McKeague, Park def. Quinton Heiman, Hastings, 64 , 62 , ; Doubles: No. 1 Henry Ascheman Devon Yang, Hastings def. Robert Menard Ethan Lo, Park , 63 , 63 , ; No. 2 Caleb Teegarden Charlie Jensen, Hastings def. Joshua Hess Parker Jeseritz, Park , 67 , 64 , 62 ; No. 3 Ethan Cole Andrew McDonald, Park def. Matt Darst Maddox Repke, Hastings, 63 , 75.

Photo by Bruce Karnick