Sep. 3—TRAVERSE CITY — Traverse City Central gained another point on Traverse City West in the 2024 battle for city bragging rights as the Trojans defeated the Titans, 7-1, in boys varsity tennis action Tuesday.
“It was a good win for us,” Central head coach Casey Christensen said. “The Central-West rivalry is always a fun thing, and both teams are always fired up. West is definitely more competitive than they were my first couple years, so we had to be ready for that.”
Central took three out of four in the singles flights and swept doubles action in a dominating victory over their crosstown rivals at Central High. The win comes just a week after the two Big North squads saw each other in a quad meet at which the Trojans won 6-2.
“For us to go 7-1, that’s pretty good,” Christensen said. “We put up a good result last week against some pretty good teams in Birmingham Seaholm and Clarkston, so you’re always nervous about how the guys are going to respond in a rivalry match like this and avoid the letdown — which I’ve seen time and time again.”
Tanner Cooley defeated Edward Chan in one-singles, 6-0 and 6-0. Alex Lamphier knocked off Ryan Goodrich in two-singles, 6-1 and 6-1. Riley White won in three-singles over Carter Carroll, 6-0 and 6-0.
“Our strength is the top of our singles lineup,” Christensen said. “Having Tanner Cooley back at the top of the lineup makes us that much better. He’s a legitimate state semifinalist-level player — if not better. That shifts our whole lineup down, and Alex Lamphier and Riley White are having great seasons so far. These kids are battled-tested.”
West’s only win came at four-singles as Tyler Chan beat Haru Matsuzaki, 6-2 and 6-2.
“It didn’t go our way,” West head coach Kyle Warner said. “There were a couple flights that I thought we might be able to take, but it’s always tough to walk into Central’s tennis courts and see all the signs and history there and perform your best. It was nice to see some grit out of my four-singles player and some fight in my lower doubles.”
In doubles play, Max Betten and Helly Taylor defeated Steven Biteman and Jonah Arbuckle, 6-2 and 6-2, at one-doubles. Asher Petersen and Finn Fisher defeated Trey Stewart and Tucker Ballenger, 6-0 and 6-2, in two-doubles.
“It was nice to see my one- and two-doubles teams find some consistency and settle in,” Christensen said.
Nate Brewer and Chris Girrbach won at three-doubles over Patrick Milne and Colton Bible, 7-5 and 6-2. Oliver Christensen and Holden Beery completed the clean sweep with a 6-4, 7-5 win over Nolan Bildeaux and Owen Jongekrijg in four-doubles.
Christensen said he challenged Brewer and Girrbach after their loss to West last week, and the head coach was pleased with how they responded.
“I told them, ‘Hey, this is a rivalry, and you guys need to be better,'” he said. “They are both first-year varsity guys, but they work really hard and are very talented. You just want to see that consistency. Can they bring their A stuff every match? And if they don’t have their A stuff, can they find a way to win with the B-level game? So I was really happy. Anytime you call a kid out and they respond, that just makes for a happy coach.”
Christensen said the win will definitely be a help moving forward.
“Those rivalry wins always have value, no matter how good the opponent is on any given year,” he said. “When you win the crosstown one, it always helps the guys with confidence.”
Although Tuesday marked the first day of school for most in northern Michigan, the tennis season has been marching right along with regionals just over a month away.
“It’s kind of a wind sprint,” Christensen said of how fast the season moves. “I tell the younger guys that, at this point, they’re not first-year guys anymore. They’ve got 10-12 matches under their belt and have to start playing like it.”
Warner said he has joked with other coaches that their season was basically wrapped up this week.
“We play Central and Petoskey this week, and then we’ve got Cadillac — which we’ve seen twice already this season and come out victorious — and then Alpena a week later. After that, it’s BNC and regionals. It’s absolutely crazy that we get most of our season done now,” he said.
The Trojans hit the road for a quad Saturday, taking on host Flushing as well as Midland and Carleton. Both Flushing and Midland are in Central’s regional, and Christensen said it will be beneficial for seeding if Central can pick up those head-to-head wins.
West looks to rebound against a talented Petoskey team on Thursday at home.
“That’s going to be another tough match,” Warner said. “We’ll see how it goes on Thursday.”
