Five-and-one isn’t that bad
“This is the first time I’ve lost to him with the guys. I’m 5-1 against Nelson,” Otto further explained, trying to sell the headline idea while standing next to Nelson’s brother, Bill Nelson, at the Racquet Club to watch his son try to improve to 6-2 at first singles for West Holmes, and laughing along with Otto at the win-loss statistic.
So, why not?
If the coach wants to coach and write the headline, then there’s no need to come up with a catchy phrase like “Full-Nelson” or “All in the Family,” to reference the first singles match between the Knights and Titans involving West Holmes sophomore Danny Nelson, taking the court against a player and team coached by his uncle.
But as Otto also explained, “Triway is very good this year, one through seven.”
And especially at number one where Triway senior Kyle Patterson – already penciled in as the first singles player at Baldwin-Wallace College next season – used powerful, consistent first and second serves not seen in most high school players – along with strong, accurate, well-placed ground strokes – to beat Nelson 6-2, 6-2.
“You just have to tune out the full aspect of the relationship and just look at him as another opponent,” explained Patterson who missed his entire junior season with a foot injury that required multiple surgeries. “I’ve never played him before but you just keep to the same fundamentals, move your feet, hit below the ball and try to stay patient and consistent and make him make the mistakes.”
But even though the score seemed lopsided in the end, Nelson didn’t really make a lot of mistakes. Patterson simply placed balls in areas of the court where Nelson couldn’t reach or get to in time to produce a strong return.
“I was very happy with the way Danny played,” said Otto afterward. “I actually thought Danny played his best match of the year.”
And that says a lot about Patterson, which Jim Nelson also did.
“Family comes first in my life and Danny’s a great kid,” said the Titans head coach. “I would have liked for my nephew to have won, but Kyle’s ability level is much greater than Danny’s right now. Not his effort, or his heart, or his sportsmanship, but his athletic ability is much greater than Danny and that was the difference.
“Kyle’s been playing a lot more and he’s a senior. The better player won and with my brother there’s no ill will because we both know the better player won tonight.”
It’s unclear if the better player won at second singles, however, as Lynch put his streak on the line a day after missing school with a condition described by his coach and father as bronchitis.
Despite that, Lynch won the first game, playing the same style of tennis he always plays, getting to everything on the court and returning every single ball.
“That’s very frustrating to some players,” said Otto, and it was clearly frustrating to Flickinger at the outset of the match, bringing his coach onto the court with words of wisdom during the first changeover.
“Brendan’s strong points are the consistency and the speed,” explained the Triway head coach. “So you have to counteract that by hitting the ball out more. He’s [Flickinger] got to hit through the ball and go for the offensive shots. He can’t just keep the ball in play or he might as well pitch a tent and be there all day, and Lynch will probably beat him. He’s got to beat him on his offensive shots. When he’s got a shot, take it. Go for the winners more.”
Flickinger went for more winners and found them, completing the 6-2, 6-2 victory, while Triway’s Andrew Tarutani played a similar style to Lynch in winning 6-0, 6-1 at third singles over West Holmes senior Ethan Rawson, who tried to attack the net at every opportunity and got beat by a number of deep lobs and unforced errors.
“That was my strategy tonight,” explained Otto in reference to Rawson’s continually charging the net. “I told him, because the kid he plays doesn’t mess up – kind of like Brendan – you’ve got to put the ball away. You’re going to have to get in there and try to volley it away, because the kid’s just real consistent.”
Tarutani stayed consistent and made his shots even in the face of Rawson’s attack, completing the singles sweep for Triway.
Meanwhile, consistency and shot making also helped Triway’s top doubles pairing of Daniel Doan and Adam Zimmerman cruise to a 6-0, 6-2 win over the West Holmes first singles team of Sam Meyer and Collin Galbraith, leaving Otto’s second doubles pairing of Ricky Guerra and Evan Aurand with the last opportunity to steal a point from Triway, after stringing together a 5-0 record on the season and producing decisive wins against Wooster and Granville earlier in the year.
Reminiscent of the Wooster match in which they found themselves down 5-2 in the second set, before rallying to win a tie-breaker and eventually win the match in three sets, Guerra and Aurand dropped the first set to Kyle Starkey and Jon Hart 6-1 and fell behind the Triway duo 5-2 in the second set.
“At 5-2 they [Starkey and Hart] thought they already had it won and they were just playing for those other guys [Guerra and Aurand] to lose,” explained Nelson. “They got ahead 5-2 and thought, ‘Oh, it’s over,’ but it’s not over until it’s over…somebody said that.”
Somebody did, and this one was far from over as Guerra and Aurand bounced back to win five straight games and take set two 7-5.
“Evan’s awesome,” said Guerra later. “He plays well by himself and I like playing with him. He knows what he’s doing. I can trust him, he can trust me, I think we have some great compatibility.
“I felt that we definitely deserved number two, we fought for that. But that third set…well it was bad,” added Guerra as he and Aurand’s magic wore off and they fell 6-3 in the third set to lose a thrilling 1-6, 7-5, 3-6 match.
The 5-0 sweep moved Triway to 8-1 on the season while dropping West Holmes to 5-3.
But as a 1993 Triway graduate and former employee of Jim Nelson’s in the restaurant industry years ago, Otto was able to take solace in the fact that he is still 5-1 against Triway’s head man.
That isn’t bad.
And that’s the headline to this story.
Published: April 20, 2011
