CENTRAL NEW YORK – Leading their respective Salt City Athletic Conference divisions, the Fayetteville-Manlius and Jamesville-DeWitt boys tennis teams also wanted to maintain undefeated marks.
To do so, the Hornets would have to win a Thursday showdown with Baldwinsville that would ultimately get decided by a comeback in fourth doubles that allowed F-M to edge the Bees 4-3.
Trailing after they lost the first set 6-4, Will Ferguson and Zach Costanza roared back to beat Connor Davidson and Tom Canfield 6-3 and 6-4 in the next two sets to add to a trio of straight-set wins.
The teams of Justin Dunn-Dan Manta and William Sul-John Gilligan swept, as did Cameron Lukasik in singles, beating Mason Doan 6-1, 6-2. In three sets, Colin Byer fell to Eric Ventura 7-6, 6-7, 6-1, with Sawyer Brown and Jared Duggal taking a 6-3, 1-6, 6-4 defeat to Kai Wilson and Nick Fogu.
J-D, meanwhile, handled Auburn 6-1 last Monday for its fifth win in a row, dominating doubles. Jacob Price and Kian Sarmast beat John White and Bill Li 6-4, 6-1 as the teams of Will Sharlow-Carson Souser, Lucas Chiorini-Furqan Hasan and Harman Butalia-Mekael Hamlin all prevailed in two sets.
Up in singles, Anthony Fico dropped a tough 7-5, 7-5 match to Riley Fitzgerald, but the Rams got the other points when Dean Bratslavsky routed Colby Wagner 6-1, 6-1 and Zain Hegazy won 6-0, 6-2 over Kevin Lui.
In Wednesday’s 7-0 shutout of Oswego, J-D got two forfeits, but also doubles wins from the teams of Sharlow-Souser, Sarmast-Jacob Price and Iskender Mambetaliev-Alex Parratt, while in singles Fico battled past Duncan Baker 6-4, 6-3 and Bratslavsky rolled past Tyler Avalos 6-0, 6-1.
Then, in Friday’s match against Syracuse East, J-D won by a 6-1 margin, with a doubles sweep and a tough 6-4, 6-3 singles win by Sharlow over Kipling Korba-Davis as Fico handled Dante Cox 6-0, 6-1.
Another local undefeated side, Christian Brothers Academy, made it six in a row last Tuesday by putting away Manlius Pebble Hill in a 5-0 decision.
Gabriel Yang’s singles win was complemented by Chanu Yang shutting out Jon Howard 6-0, 6-0 and Soren Kang topping Savir Gambhir 6-2, 6-2. In doubles, Joe Riccelli and John Engle won, 7-6 (8-6), 6-3 over Andy and Sam Lurvey as the team of Hunter Szatkowski and Andrew Arcuri also won in two sets.
MPH was 4-0 on the season before running into Cazenovia last Monday and falling 4-1 to the Lakers.
It took a comeback in second doubles for the Trojans to get on the board, the Lurveys overcoming a slow start to beat Cy Lurie and Ethan Camp 2-6, 6-0, 6-1. Cazenovia swept singles and, in first doubles, had Max Reger and Evan Molloy get through a first-set tie-break to beat Salomon and Trikha 7-6, 6-0.
A day later, MPH fell 3-2 to Chittenango, who kept its own unbeaten mark when Noah Edwards beat Savir Gambhir 7-3 in a tiebreak after their single-set match ended 10-10. Jasmin Zahman did win in singles, 10-1, over Logan Bronner, while in doubles the Lurvey brothers took a tough 10-7 match over Bernardo Bartovski and Cole Thomas.
Breaking the skid on Thursday, MPH beat Cortland 4-1, helped by a singles forfeit and doubles shutouts by Salomon-Trikha and the Lavners as Gambhir, in singles, handled Jeremie Hale 6-4, 6-2.
East Syracuse Minoa got past Central Square 4-3 last Monday entirely based on its play in doubles, where it swept all four matches to make up for three-set singles defeats from Jacob McGuigan and Aaron Martin, the latter of which got to a third-set tiebreak before a 7-5, 3-6, 7-6 (7-5) defeat to Sam Fallows.
The Spartans’ teams of Jayce Domres-Jacob Harmon, Donovan Randall-Brett Hockey and Ari Oviedo-Carter Jacobs each won in two sets, with Jude Rudnick and Owen Tompkins having to go to three sets to beat Andrew Beardsley and Brian Purdy 6-2, 2-6, 6-2.
Another win followed on Thursday, ESM topping Oswego 6-1 with a doubles sweep along with Yaniel Valdes, in singles, routing Jackson Hollenbeck 6-1, 6-1 as Hockey took a turn in singles and beat Liam Shiel 6-0, 6-1.
Making it three straight wins on Friday, the Spartans turned back Auburn 4-3, again with a doubles sweep.
The teams of Domres-Harmon, Oviedo-Hockey and Martin-Rudnick each won in two sets, but Tompkins and Carter Jacobs had to make quite a comeback to get the clinching point 2-6, 6-1, 6-1 over Noah and Owen Mahunik. In singles, McGuigan had a 6-7 (7-5), 6-4, 10-2 defeat to Wagner.
