Enough snow had cleared out on area high school tennis courts for a handful of matches to take place and a new season to get underway.
Jamesville-DeWitt, expected to top the Salt City Athletic Conference Empire division despite the graduation of the likes of Robert Dotterer (who had more than 100 career wins), had an immediate test last Monday against Fulton, but did enough to defeat the Red Raiders 4-3.
The pivotal match came in fourth singles. With Fulton already owning a pair of points in singles and one in doubles, J-D’s Mark Bratslavsky needed to prevail against Charles Hyland and, in three close sets, pulled it out 7-6, 6-7 (7-5), 7-5.
Somil Aggarwal had dropped a 7-5, 6-4 decision to Anthony Salerno, with William Guisbond falling to Ryan Lalik 7-5, 6-3. Eric Benaroch rescued the Rams’ other singles point, beating Eric Shear 6-4, 6-3.
In doubles, Aniket Maini and Anthony Pitts lost in three sets to Collin Bennett and Hunter Dudley 6-3, 4-6, 6-4, but the teams of Druv Nanavati-Essex Glowaki and Salim Farwagi-Wesley Sharlow each claimed straight-set decisions.
East Syracuse Minoa opened its season against Oswego, getting all of its points in singles, but shut out in doubles during a 4-3 defeat to the Buccaneers.
Bryant Pham blanked Chris Colusurdo 6-0, 6-0 in first singles. John Kipping got past John Rice 6-4, 7-5 and Kelvin Cheng beat Neel Tripathi 6-2, 6-3.
Ben Houseman was a set away from getting the clinching point against Zach DeMott in fourth singles, only to take a 6-2, 5-7, 6-4 defeat as Oswego claimed all three doubles matches in straight sets.
Once the snow returned mid-week, though, all other area tennis matches were postponed, waiting again for conditions to warm up – and perhaps dry up – in the second week of April.
