By Travis Smola
Vicksburg’s tennis season ended sooner than the team had hoped at Regional playoffs.
After a dominant start to the season where the team continually piled up the wins, Head Coach Warner Offord had high hopes going into the Conference and Regional tournaments.
At Conference, it looked like things were still going the Bulldogs’ way as the team came in second. Junior Connor Seifert continued his extremely strong season by becoming champion in the number 4 singles competition.
Senior Bryce O’Neill also had a good showing with a runner-up finish in the number 1 singles. Freshman Ayden Flickinger finished third in the number 3 singles and senior Caleb Fort took fourth in the number 2 singles.
In doubles action, the team of sophomore Jonathan Perkins and senior Jeremy Henderson took third place in the number 4 doubles.
But when Vicksburg got to the Regional round in Three Rivers, things didn’t go quite as well when they ran into some tennis powerhouse teams. “I thought we should have done a lot better than we did, but we ran into St. Joe,” Offord said.
Unfortunately, most of the boys were eliminated early in Regionals. The team of Perkins and Henderson was the only doubles team to make it to the semi-final round where they lost to a very good St. Joseph team.
After Perkins and Henderson were eliminated, Seifert was the last Bulldog left standing as he made it to the championship round. In a very long and grueling match in unseasonably warm early October weather, Seifert also lost to a St. Joseph player – not for a lack of effort however, and with his teammates cheering to the end.