Cyclones look to serve opponents this season
The HCHS Cyclones tennis team is returning from a season where they boys finished 0-21 and the girls finished 5-19. Nevertheless, the team is excited to get back on the court and begin the season.
“I’m so excited to get the season going,” said Senior Emily Lee. “I have a feeling it’s going to be a good season.”
During practice, Coaches Dillon Stane and Michael Rueschenberg have been emphasizing to the squad what will be key to winning matches.
“This first week of practice we emphasize the broad strokes of the game to give the kids that have never played before a starting point,” Stane said. “Tennis is a unique sport with the scoring and procedural stuff and we will take time to teach them even where to stand on the court. Then we start to focus on how we play out points, and games so that when they get into the matches they feel comfortable with their unique play style.”
Stane is looking to two girls to potentially take the top spot this season. On the boys side, he will have one of his returners taking the number one spot for his senior year.
“On the girl's team we will have some competition for the one spot, and it will be between Anastacia Kay and Naia Ojeda,” he said. “We are excited to see how this plays out between the two because it only makes our team stronger. Anastacia has spent the summer working on speeding up her game and being more aggressive. Naia has been a complete surprise for us being a foreign exchange student. We have seen her play a couple of times at open courts and have been extremely impressed with her product. The boys side we are expecting Colton Hagle to remain our number one. Last year we focused on him winning points to stay competitive in a tough conference. This year we see him being more competitive against a lot of new number-ones for these other teams.”
Stane said other athletes are capable of filling other varsity spots.
“Kobe Klaassen is one we are expecting to come out and make an immediate impact on the team,” he added. “He is a tall athletic boy that will be able to impose his style on the other team. Dale Scheuring played some varsity for us last year. We are hoping to see him continue to grow and sneak into that varsity line up. Jeb Sonderman, Kaden Herbst, and Abram Wilwerding are all returning starters for us as well. Chloe Swensen is our only other returning starter so we will see a lot of change. Julia Pando has impressed us with her ball speed and is expected to make a large impact for our team. Hadley Argotsinger played some varsity last year and impressed us on the first day of practice. Brylie Kenkel had a good first day of practice and we hope will be in that conversation for a varsity spot.”
The boys first match of the season will be April 1 at Council Bluffs Abraham Lincoln, while the girls will open their season April 10 at home against Denison.
“I am so excited to be able to open the season at home,” Lee said. “It is nice to be able to start the season on a court I’m used to. I think the key to starting this season right is practice. Training in some way everyday to keep and not allowing myself to get in my head.”
