For the West Genesee boys tennis team, the ultimate test was at hand.
The Wildcats were a big part of last week’s Section III Class A tournament at SUNY-Cortland, especially Connor McGuigan and James Plunkett, who gave the Wildcats a chance at the first doubles championship.
McGuigan and Plunkett started with a 6-0, 6-2 romp over Oswego’s Alex Haessig and Noah Wells, following up by beating Liverpool’s Evan Vogue and Evan Maestri 6-3, 7-6 in the semifinals to set up a title match against the Fayetteville-Manlius duo of James DeSorbo and Vince Sorrentino.
Though the match proved close all the way through, McGuigan and Plunkett could not gain the crucial games in either set, allowing DeSorbo and Sorrentino to prevail by 6-4 margins for a two-set victory.
In second doubles, Stefan Atanasov, paired with Pat Copeland, won their quarterfinal over Liverpool’s Caleb and Jake Munski 6-3, 6-4, but fell in the semifinals to the Baldwinsville duo of Mason Soeder and Scott Ferrari 6-0, 6-2.
Chris Upwood played third singles, and got within two games of advancing out of the quarterfinals before Watertown’s Aiden King beat him in three sets 7-5, 5-7, 6-4. King went on to a three-set semifinal win over Justin Kegebein (Cicero-North Syracuse) before he lost in the finals to F-M’s Tom Miro.
Nick Bentley, playing in second singles, lost in his opening match to Watertown’s Kevin Sanchez 6-2, 6-1.
Westhill, who was part of the Class B sectional tournament at Utica’s Mott Courts, saw Mike Ferrara and Ryan Rolince beat teams from East Syracuse Minoa and Carthage to get to the second doubles semifinals, only to fall to Jamesville-DeWitt’s Ishan Gajra and Alex Tso 6-0, 6-1.
Connor Catone and Tom Chaddock, playing in first doubles, did not get out of the opening round, falling to Tommy Daviau and Geoff Parkes (CBA) 6-1, 6-0, while Marcellus had its top duo of Trevor Costa and Noah LaFever reach the quarterfinals before a 6-0, 6-0 defeat to J-D’s Robert Dotterer and Peter Hatton.
The Mustangs’ Connor Lundgren did get to the quarterfinals in second singles, but took a 6-1, 7-5 defeat to CBA’s Jameson Keppeler. Andrew Kammer rallied past Tom Reynolds (Carthage) 4-6, 6-2, 6-1, only to take a 6-1, 6-2 quarterfinal loss to New Hartford’s John Robert Corasanti.
Westhill’s’ Jackson Bradley and Sabastian Ramirez each lost in the opening round of their respective singles divisions. Ramirez fell to Ethan Ruszala (Central Valley Academy) 6-1, 6-2, while Bradley lost, 6-3, 6-1, to New Hartford’s Matt Cioni.
