Sturgis tennis plays well during busy weekend, including Great Eight

The Sturgis tennis team once again hosted the Great Eight on Thursday. It featured an impressive collection of eight tennis programs at Augspurger Courts, including a pair of state champions from last year.

The Trojans piled up 10 points this year, this put them in sixth place for the day. Bloomfield Hills Cranbrook Kingswood won with 19 points, both Midland Dow and Ann Arbor Greenhills tied for second place with 18 points. Traverse City St. Francis recorded 12 for fourth, Forest Hills Eastern and Sturgis each recorded 10 points, St. Joseph finished with 10 points and Portage Northern had zero.

Greenhills, which is home to 13 state championships under coach Eric Gajar, has appeared in every Great Eight tournament except the 2020 COVID year. They had won five of the previous eight Great Eight titles.

Last year, Cranbrook Kingswood and Traverse City St. Francis brought home state championships.

Sturgis’ Grady Miller finished with a 2-1 mark at fourth singles. He won a couple of lopsided matches, beating Joe Pierangeli of St. Joseph by a score of 6-0, 6-0 and Brady Thelen of Traverse City St. Francis by a score of 6-1, 6-0. Miller’s lone loss came to Amaan Khaan of Cranbrook Kingswood 6-0, 6-2.

Also finishing with a 2-1 mark on the day was the fourth doubles team. Ian Earl and Ian Golden won a pair of matches by score of 6-4 and 6-4. In those matches, the Sturgis duo knocked off Quinten Musgrave and Will Sutton of Traverse City St. Francis and the team of John Schmitt and Luke Murdoch of St. Joseph. The team’s lone loss was to Midland Dow’s duo of Konner Janeczko and Dominic Griffin by a score of 6-0 and 6-2.

All other Sturgis flights finished with records of 1-2 on the day.

At first singles, Walter Ebert won his match over Sreejay Ramakrishnan of Forest Hills Eastern, it came by scores of 6-4 and 6-3. Walter would drop matches to Chakor Rajendra of Ann Arbor Greenhills 6-1, 6-0 and Austin King of Midland Dow 6-1, 6-4. Rajendra is the fourth-ranked senior in Michigan and is nationally ranked. He recently played in the national tournament at Kalamazoo College and had not lost a match in his high school career until Saturday, when he was beaten by Owen DeMuth of Cranbrook Kingswood, 6-4 and 6-3. DeMuth is the fifth-ranked senior in Michigan and also nationally ranked. His is committed to play tennis at Georgia Tech next fall.

George Ebert (second singles) won his match over Anshul Monhanty of Portage Northern by a score of 6-0, 6-2. His other two matches saw George fall to Rishi Verma of Ann Arbor Greenhills (6-0, 6-1) and Owen Jackson of Traverse City St. Francis by a score of 6-2, 6-0. Verma is the sixth-ranked senior in Michigan and is also nationally ranked. He is committed to continue his tennis career at Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania.

In third singles action, Aiden Whitehead finished with a victory over Nathan Gleason of Portage Northern 6-1, 6-0. Whitehead dropped matches on the day to Kabir Rajendra of Ann Arbor Greenhills by a score of 6-0, 6-0 and Chris Bobrowski of Traverse City St. Francis by a score of 3-6, 6-2 and 10-4.

All three Sturgis doubles teams won a match.

At first doubles, the SHS team of Christian Perry and Luke Frost picked up a victory over Rohan Singh and Arya Verma of Portage Northern by a score of 6-0 and 6-2. The Trojan duo fell to Andrew Fink and Jace Bernard of Cranbrook Kingswood at 6-1, 6-0 and Shiva Rajan and Devin Kozal of Forest Hills Eastern by a score of 6-4, 6-4.Preston Gump and Drake Harker at second doubles picked up a win over Rylan Falk and Robbie Lennon of Portage Northern at 6-0 and 7-5. Sturgis’ group fell to Max King and Eli Schmude of Traverse City Francis by a score of 2-6, 6-1 and 10-3. They also dropped a match to Roofy Elsaadany and Aiden Tanis of Midland Dow by a score of 6-4 and 6-0.

In third doubles play, Adam Baker and George Bucklin won over Suhas Tatieneni and Joel Sebastian of Portage Northern with a sore of 6-3 and 7-6 (3). They fell to Evan Foltyn and Eli Foltyn of Cranbrook Kingswood by a score of 6-1, 6-4 and the team of David Ansley and Carson Poole of Traverse City St. Francis with a score of 2-6, 7-6 (3) and 10-6.

On Saturday, the Trojans hosted both Vicksburg and Chelsea for some tennis action.

Chelsea won with 13 points, Sturgis finished second with eight points. Vicksburg came in third position with three total points.

Both Walter Ebert at first singles and Miller at fourth singles played to 2-0 records on the day for the Trojans.Walter won over Jackson Bowles of Vicksburg in straight sets at 6-0, 6-0. He also picked up a double tiebreaker win over Peter Mourad of Chelsea, winning 7-6 (1) and 7-6 (1).

Miller beat Logan Schwenk of Vicksburg with a score of 6-2 and 6-1. He aso claimed a win over Julien Korner of Chelsea by way of a 5-7, 7-6 (6) and 11-9 score.

Second singles saw George Ebert split his matches on the day. He picked up a win over Nathan Klimek of Vicksburg by a score of 6-1, 6-1 but fell to Mason Strach of Chelsea in straight sets 6-2, 6-3.

Whitehead at third singles played to a split in his matches as well. He won over Jordan Diekman of Vicksburg in three sets, winning the first 6-1 but dropping the second 6-2. Whitehead won the tiebreaker with a score of 10-5. Ryan Fredricksen of Chelsea beat Whitehead 6-1, 6-1.

In doubles play, the top two Sturgis teams played to 1-1 records on the day.

Perry and Frost won their match over Harrison Barton and Luke Wilson of Vicksburg by scores of 6-0, 6-0. The Sturgis duo dropped a match to Joshua O’Brien and Quinn Tjerangel of Chelsea by a score of 7-5 and 6-4.In two doubles play, Sturgis’ team of Gump and Harker beat Caden Town and Gabriel Ryder of Vicksburg with scores of 6-2 and 6-4. The same group fell to Evan Frudzinksi and Jack Murray of Chelsea by scores of 6-4 and 6-4.

Sturgis’ third and fourth doubles teams both played to 0-2 records. The third doubles team of Baker and Bucklin fell to Owen Mcculloch and JP Chinavare of Chelsea with a score of 6-0, 6-2 and they dropped a 6-1, 7-5 match to Maddox Rosalin and Colin Schramer of Vicksburg as well. The fourth doubles team of Ian Earl and Ian Golden dropped matches to Sawyer Kite and Connor Rugg of Vicksburg by scores of 6-1, 6-3 and the team of Trevor Ford and Keegan Van Batavia of Chelsea at 6-1, 6-0.

This article originally appeared on Sturgis Journal: Sturgis tennis plays well during busy weekend, including Great Eight