Through all of the matches they contested with other opponents during a busy week of action, the Liverpool and Cicero-North Syracuse boys tennis teams still remembered that they would face each other, too, on Thursday afternoon.
And when that took place, the Warriors got the best of it, beating the Northstars 5-2 primarily because it won all four of the doubles matches on the slate.
Sam Min and Evan Vogue got it started, stopping Justin Kegelbein and Connor Milias 7-6, 6-4, with Mike Fensken and Mitch Virkler handling Jack Irwin and Nate Perrotta 6-0, 6-2.
The other doubles matches went to three sets. Logan Enzerillo and Griffin Watson lost a second-set tie-breaker, but recovered to beat Andrew Hughs and Kyle Spivalk 6-1, 6-7 (7-2), 6-3, with Adam Reed and Michael Sill getting a 6-2, 3-6, 6-3 decision over Graham Dittler and Andrew Fehrman.
Moving to singles play, Brian Emigolz got a point for C-NS, as did Rich Dennis with his 6-4, 7-5 win over Leon Truong, but Liverpool countered with Evan Maestri beating Connor Doren 6-0, 6-2.
At the start of its week, Liverpool took on Auburn, and though the proceedings were cut short, the Warriors still managed to eke out a 4-2 victory over the Maroons.
And it did so without a point in singles. Laviolette and Maestri swept Jack Farrington and Brian Franceschelli 6-2, 6-2, but all of the other matches went to three sets.
Enerzillo and Watson got past Shane Lawrence and Josh Lupo 7-6 (7-4), 4-6, 6-2, with Fensken and Virkler rallying past Trevor Mohannon and Luke Parker 3-6, 6-2, 6-2. Reed and Sill claimed a 6-2, 4-6, 7-5 decision over Willie Clarke and Jake Wanser. Truong and Min each lost their singles matches.
By contrast, Cicero-North Syracuse had to start the week facing powerhouse Fayetteville-Manlius, and unable to get a point out of them in a 7-0 defeat to the Hornets.
All of the competitive matches were on the doubles side. Doren and Emgolz fell to Taran Judge and Chris Lansing 7-5, 6-0, with Hughs and Spivalk falling to Ravi Dhawan and Vince Grasso by those exact same scores. Irwin and Perrotta lost, 7-5, 6-3, to Dhawan and Richard Wang.
None of C-NS’s three singles players – Dennis, Kavin Inthirakot and Ryan Grenninger – managed to earn a game in defeats to, respectively, Josh Druger, Riley Ma and Jeremy Zhang.
At least the Northstars got a point in Wednesday’s match against West Genesee, though it still took a 6-1 defeat to the Wildcats. Only Grenninger had a close singles set, but lost to Parker Ventura 6-4, 6-1 as Dennis fell to Connor McGuigan 6-0, 6-0 and Inthirakot had a 6-1, 6-1 loss to Chris Upwood.
The only point came in doubles, where Irwin and Perrotta had to go three sets to get past Jobin Purthuparampil and John Harter 6-2, 4-6, 10-8. Otherwise, Kegebein and Millias had the closest call in a 6-4, 6-4 defeat to Nick Bentley and Aaron Wierbinski.
When Liverpool took its turn at F-M on Wednesday, the result was the same at C-NS – a 7-0 defeat, and few games gained in any of those seven matches. Fensken did the most in singles, but lost 6-3, 6-1, to Zhang, while in doubles the Hornets only got scared in the second set of one match, where Truong and Virkler fell to Dhawan and Grasso 6-2, 7-5.
But the Warriors faced Cortland that same day and won 7-0, with straight-set singles wins from Laviolette, Maestri and Truong, plus doubles matches where the teams of Min-Vogue, Enzerillo-Watson, Virkler-Vogue and Reed-Sill did not drop a set in any of their matches, either.
