For the ninth straight time, Sioux Falls Lincoln is celebrating a boy’s high school state tennis title. The Patriots claimed their most recent championship on Friday afternoon in Sioux Falls. Competition began Thursday indoors, due to the air quality with the smoke from the recent Canadian wildfires making their way into South Dakota. While all of Friday’s action was outdoors, at least for the spectators, it was bit chilly.
“The weather you never know. Boys or girls, you never know if it’s going to be, nice or not,” explained Lincoln head tennis coach Tom Krueger. “I always think that if the crowd is cold, and the kids are in shorts and t-shirts, it’s probably just right, because you don’t get [the kids] overheating. And the wind stayed down, which is a blessing in tennis.”
Lincoln finished with an impressive 588.5 points at the top of the tournament standings. O’Gorman placed second with 409.5, Harrisburg in third with 321.5, and Sioux Falls Washington at fourth with 320.5. For complete team standings, click here.
“I’m just so proud in the way they always step up. They do a lot of summer tournaments, a lot of off-season tournaments, and then get to the pressure situations like this and they’re able to handle it so well,” Krueger stated. “To win eight of nine flights is an incredible accomplishment, and I’m just proud of the way they all stepped up.”
The only flight that the Patriots did not win was Singles Flight 4. In that one, Lincoln's Arthur Tao finished runner-up. Liam Sarmiento of O’Gorman won the title in that flight. The first-place finishers in singles for Lincoln were Rocky McKenzie (S1), Drew Gohl (S2), River McKenzie (S3), Christopher Tao (S5), and Jacob Husser (S6). The six singles competitors then all teamed up to win all three doubles flights for the Patriots as well.
This run of state championships extends back to 2014 for Lincoln. In total, the program has twenty titles. Their first in boys’ tennis came back in 1976. Despite the success over the past decade, coach Krueger mentioned that he never foresaw this current streak.
“You kind of see who you have, and you think, maybe we can do something for three or four years. I didn’t see the McKenzie’s on the horizon, or the Gohl’s, and the Tao’s and the Husser’s and you don’t know you’ve got more of those families coming through that are going to keep feeding the program,” told Krueger. “You hope you can get a couple in a row, but to do nine of them together, it’s a whole different group of people than who got us that first title.”
Throughout the past decade, the game has also started to evolve. New schools have popped up, three years ago the sport divided into two classes, and just the overall style is evolving too.
“It's a big power game now. If you look how [Rocky McKenzie] plays, especially, they’re just pounding the ball and pounding returns, and that’s unique. Some of that is equipment, but a lot of that is the style of play,” exclaimed Krueger. “And then nationally, there’s a different type of play too with the professionals. There’s a lot more people getting up to the net, they’re not just standing back in the baseline and pounding away, so you’re starting to see more of an all-court game, and some of that trickles into [high school] too.”
While Lincoln technically has four seniors on their printed roster, they have no seniors amongst their six varsity starters. This mean that next season, the Patriots will bring back everyone for a run at ten straight.
“It's a nice feeling,” Krueger joked. “To have the kids come in this young is unique, and it’s nice to not have five seniors and have to start all over again. Now we’ve got three juniors, so next year we’ll be losing half the team, but we’ll see what happens. We’ll worry about that later, but to have all six of these guys back next year is pretty cool.”
