MOUNT VERNON — It was a tough afternoon for the Mount Vernon High School boys tennis team on Thursday. The Yellow Jackets struggled through a winless match versus Olentangy, falling, 5-0. The best that they can do is use the experience to help them later in the year.
“We knew we were coming into the tough stretch of our season,” said Mount Vernon tennis coach Jeff Jarosz. “At the beginning of the year, we got a really long run of wins, but we knew things were going to get more difficult as we got into our conference. That’s really it. We are working real hard, but we are just running into some stiff competition. This is the competition that we are going to see in sectionals, so we are trying to prepare. Unfortunately, it just seems we are at the wrong end of the stick.”
In the singles matches, Mount Vernon’s Austin Kasserman lost in straight sets to Drew Openlander, 6-3, 6-1. Chris Jaymes of Mount Vernon was also dropped in straight sets, 6-4, 6-4, to Olentangy’s Sam Kelly. Meanwhile, Mount Vernon’s Russels Ramser was defeated by Greg Hawk of Olentangy, 6-3, 3-6, 6-2.
“During the regular season, we would like to play Chris and Austin at singles because they are two of our strongest players, but when we go to sectionals, we’re going to put them in doubles together,” said Jarosz.
In the doubles matches, Mount Vernon’s John Flemming and Aaron Lynn lost to Olentangy’s Tanner Greene and Brett Cooper, 7-5, 6-7 (8-6), 6-2. In the other match, Mount Vernon’s Nate Pressler and Jesse Shuman lost in straight sets to Olentangy’s Nick Ludwig and Alex Browning, 6-4, 6-4.
“We have really good ground strokes and really good serving,” said Jarosz. “The guys have really good knowledge of the game. They know what to hit and when. It just seems that when we have volleys to put away, we just don’t put them away. We just don’t finish off points the way we need to.”
Up next for the Jackets is another league match on Tuesday. The match, originally scheduled as a home game, will be played at Pickerington Central at 4:30 p.m.