Tennis gets into gear
SWING! On Sat. April 7, Gold will play Jackson HS and New Albany. Green will play West Clermont on Fri. April. 6. JV plays Kings High School on Mon. April 9.
Mon. April 2, the boys tennis team competed in their first match of the season. Preparing for the season for almost seven months already, the team dominated their matches.
The culture of men’s tennis at SHS is one of dedication and hard work. They offer preseason conditioning moths before the actual season to ensure the team is strong to get off to a good start.
“Preseason conditioning started late October and went through all of February. Conditioning was every Tuesday and Thursday morning from 6-6:30 a.m. Conditioning is mostly based on leg work like springs and footwork drills, but we also do core and upper body workouts as well,” said Jacob Wittenbaum, 11.
Although spending time on the court is essential, the team also enjoys alternative forms of exercise. The team continues to prepare over the summer in various ways and encourages its players to stay attached to the sport year round.
“Through the off-season, we have team bonding and team runs which usually occur every week or so. Team bonding is when we usually play soccer, football, or any activity that will give us the opportunity to grow closer to each other to help get us ready for the season,” Wittenbaum said.
Tennis has three teams: Varsity Gold, Varsity Green, and Junior Varsity. The gold team is made up of seven players, seniors Rishav Dasgupta, Nikhil Sekar, and Nathan Zhang; juniors Matthew Bolger, Alexander Karev, and Jacob Wittenbaum; and sophomore Marcus Samuel.
Green has nine players including seniors Ryuji Nagata and Shaurya Singh; juniors David Sung and Daniel Polasky; sophomores Brenan Flanagan, Shaan Hershey, Anant Sharma, and Yash Singh; and freshman Jeffrey Sung.
Finally, JV has 14 players. This includes sophomores Emil Barr, Jonathan Chang, Ian Livingston, Dev Saxena, Butchi Smith, and Steph Stepanyan and freshmen Anagh Mishra, Seiji Nagata, Aditya Pauletti, Arvid Prasad, Davie Shi, Akbaraa Tarabushi, and Ethan Wallace.
“Tryouts began on March 5 and ended March 10. After tryouts, each team has had three weeks to practice before matches began. As of now, each team has played Lakota East and Middletown. Green played Indian Hill and Mason. JV played Mason and Indian Hill,” Wittenbaum said.
