What the West Genesee boys tennis team could not pull off in the regular season, it managed to accomplish during last week’s Section III Class A tournament at SUNY-Cortland.
Thanks to a singles sweep from Brent Boleslav, Garrett Boleslav and Connor McGuigan, the Wildcats, with 61 points, edged past long-time nemesis Fayetteville-Manlius (58 points) and earned the sectional team championship for the first time in the program’s history.
Brent Boleslav played first singles, and didn’t drop a game in either of his first two matches, shutting out Jason Wisely (Cicero-North Syracuse) and Tom Alexander (Auburn) by equal 6-0, 6-0 margins and then, in the finals, handling F-M’s Josh Druger 6-1, 6-3.
As for Garrett Boleslav, who played in second singles, he cruised past Liverpool’s Aaron Laviolette 6-0, 6-0 and Oswego’s Alex Kemper 6-1, 6-1 to reach the finals, while long matches in the other half of the bracket caused the semifinals to spill over to the next day.
Finally, F-M’s Riley Ma stepped out of that bracket to face Boleslav in the finals, but it wasn’t close as Garrett dropped one less game than Brent did, beating Ma 6-0, 6-3 for the title.
McGuigan, playing third singles, topped Syracuse East’s Alex Nguyen 6-4, 6-2 in the quarterfinals and dominated Baldwinsville’s Scott Ferrari 6-0, 6-1 in the semifinals. That set up a final with Liverpool’s Ian Szczesniak, where McGuigan swept the first set 6-0 and, despite some struggles, took the second set 6-4 to complete the singles sweep.
Alex Fox and Connor Smith paired up for WG in first doubles, where they shut out C-NS’s Rich Dennis and Connor Doren 6-0, 6-0 in the quarterfinals, earning a state qualifier berth, but lost in the semifinals to East Syracuse-Minoa’s Brandon Stone and Tyler Underwood 6-1, 6-1 and eventually took fourth place.
Moving to second doubles, Anthony Stracqualursi and Billy Viau won, 6-1, 6-1, over Watertown’s Austin Bentley and Jude Renzi, but lost in the semifinals to Baldwinsville’s Eric Johnson and Devin Murphy 6-2, 6-2, but beat Mike Fensken and Evan Vogue (Liverpool) 6-0, 6-2 for third place and valuable team points.
Meanwhile, Marcellus and Westhill had some of its top players participating in the Class B-1 sectional tournament, held at Mott Courts in Utica.
The Warriors’ best finish came in second doubles, where Fletcher Chapin and Alex Skeele beat Sam Marthage and Dan Vetere (Whitesboro) 6-0, 6-0 in the quarterfinals, but lost in the semifinals to Jake Cline and Josh Frank (Jamesville-DeWitt) 6-1, 6-2.
Then, in a remarkable comeback in the consolation bracket final, Chapin and Skeele were down a set and facing a second-set tie-breaker, but somehow rallied and beat Suveer Desai and Cameron Oliver (New Hartford) 3-6, 6-7, 6-1.
The Mustangs’ duo of Ian LaFever and Zach Ruggles beat Kevin Hall and Kyle Madison (Carthage) 6-1, 6-1, in the first round, only to fall in the quarterfinals to Desai and Oliver 6-2, 6-3.
In third singles, Westhill’s Jordan Files beat Patrick Farley (Carthage) 6-2, 6-0 in the first round, but fell to Cazenovia’s Wyatt Lansing 6-4, 6-1 in the quarterfinals as the Mustangs’ Quinton Austin led early in his first-round match, but dropped a close one to Homer’s Brian Mitchell 4-6, 6-3, 7-5.
Steve Larison, representing Marcellus in second singles, fell to Mexico’s Gary Monroe in three sets 7-6, 4-6, 6-2 in the first round, while Westhill’s Mike Parasczak fell to Sam Min (Vernon-Verona-Sherrill) 7-5, 6-4 in the quarterfinals.
Up in first singles, Marcellus’ Dave Manke and Westhill’s Brian Sheridan both lost in the first round as Manke fell to New Hartford’s Vishnu Kakuturi 6-0, 6-1, while Sheridan ran into Cortland’s Kristian Reynolds and lost by those exact same scores.
Marcellus and Westhill met the same fate in first doubles, where New Hartford’s team of Ross Padula and Sean Saltzgaber beat the Mustangs’ Geoff Golick and Andrew Herold 6-4, 6-2 in the first round, and then topped the Warriors’ Sean DeKay and Jared Ristoff in a 6-3, 3-6, 6-4 quarterfinal classic.
