DANVERS — For a third straight year, the top-ranked Pioneers’ boys tennis team will be playing for a state championship.
The Pioneers punched their ticket to Saturday’s championship final with a 3-2 win over No. 4 Hamilton-Wenham Tuesday afternoon at St. John’s Prep.
Matt Reinhold and Kurt Rothermund were the men of the hour, securing the match-winning point with a drama-filled, nerve-wracking 7-6, 7-6 (7-1) win at second doubles.
“I haven’t slept in two nights,” head coach Joe Dunn, Sr. said. “Today watching that second doubles match, there were so many points when I thought, ‘This is the one. This is the one.’ At this point, I’m not sure I can even remember my name, but I was so proud of the kids.”
Leading 6-5, Reinhold/Rothermund had five match points to close out the match, but some great shot-making on the part of opponents Jaden Wang and Alex Boardman kept the match alive to force a tiebreaker. But the Pioneers refused to be denied.
Reinhold credited Rothermund for keeping the duo’s eye on the prize.
“After being in so many deuce points in that game, Kurt pulled me over and said ‘We just have to win this.’ Our mentality switched,” Reinhold said. “We knew we had to focus on continuing to hit steady. I think we were a little anxious in the deuces as it’s very nerve-wracking. We stayed calm and just focused on doing what we do.”
“The first set was really close. They are a really strong team, so that was good. In the second set, we fell behind a bit, but persevered and had many match points, but even though we didn’t make it on those points, we gave it everything we had,” Rothermund said. “We got a nice lead in the tiebreaker and were able to close it out.”
Hamilton-Wenham got on the board first, with Rory Talyor defeating Shlok Kudrimoti 6-1, 6-1 at third singles to put the Generals on top, 1-0.
Shea McCarthy leveled the match at 1-1 with a 6-0, 6-1 win over Keenan Maguire in the second singles match. About a half hour later Dan Levin made it 2-1, Lynnfield with a 6-1, 6-1 win over Elois Chadel in the first singles match.
With Dan Levin up a set (6-1) and firmly in charge of the first singles match against Elois Chadel, all eyes turned to the two doubles matches. The first doubles team of Brendan Sokop and Russell Kasdon were down a set, having dropped the first set to Max Clarke and Henry Stinson, 3-6. Reinhold/Rothermund were up a set having taken the first set over Wang/Boardman, 7-5.
As Sokop/Kasdon pulled even with a 6-4 set in set No. 2, Reinhold/Rothermund were in a real battle. After Levin closed out his match with a 6-1 second set to make it 2-1, the Pioneers needed to win one of the doubles matches to clinch a spot in the state final. Sokop/Russell rebounded to take the second set 6-4 to tie their match at 1-1. Officials decided to pause the start of the third set pending the result of the second doubles match. They didn’t have to wait long as Reinhold/Rothermund left nothing to chance in the tiebreaker, capitalizing on three straight Generals’ errors to jump out to a 5-1 lead. After a cross-court winner by Reinhold, Rothermund closed out the match with another winner.
This will be the Pioneers’ third consecutive appearance in the state Division 4 final. The last two years, they’ve fallen at the hands of Weston, which has moved up to Division 3 this year. In fact, in the last five years the tournament has been played, the Pioneers’ season has come to an end at the hands of Weston.
This year, however, the Pioneers will take the court against No. 3 Manchester-Essex, a team the Pioneers shut out 5-0 in the regular season, but Dunn said that means nothing saying two of the five matches went three sets.
“Scores sometimes don’t mean a heck of a lot,” he said. “After not being able to find success against Weston these last few years, maybe this will be our year,” Dunn said.
Pioneers’ boys soccer coach Brent Munroe, a Marblehead resident, was on hand taking in the action. He said every Pioneer contributed a great effort and told Rothermund and Reinhold, “Just win it all on Saturday, boys, and have fun.”
