Tennis team after state finals.
On Saturday, October 7, the Tiger boys tennis team played in the inaugural state duals tournament. The Tigers made it to the 12-team tournament as the 11th seed after being 11th in power points, the ranking system is determined by how well you have done against good and bad teams in the state. The Tigers traveled to Kearney on Saturday, October 7, and faced their rival, the Adams Central Patriots in the first round.
Mark Gueswell, the second-year tennis coach, is also the Hastings High Fellowship of Christian Athletes leader. “[For] The success, I wanna give a shout out to Christ honestly because I don’t deserve anything that I have…all glory goes to him… but the credit really comes down to culture,” Gueswell said.
The Tigers played Adams Central on Thursday, October 5, which was a precursor to the match on Saturday that was a lot more important than the match on Thursday but ended in a Tiger win again.
“We just played them on Thursday, we kinda got a feel for their team, but a few kids aren’t gonna be there because of other activities on Saturday, but I’m more excited than anything because it’s our rival school,” Braydon Power, a senior tennis player said previous to their duals matchup.
The Tigers faced the Patriots in the Grand Island Central Catholic Invite to start the season and won both doubles and number one singles against Adams Central. The Tigers also hosted the Patriots in their home invite but didn’t play against them. This was the Tigers’ second time facing the Patriots this year, and the Tigers ended up finding the same success against the Patriots.
“We always have a lot of energy coming to matches, and having a lot of teamwork, so I think it’s good we got a lot of that,” said number one Tiger singles player, Ben Hafer.
The Tigers have had many ups and downs as all sports do, but being ranked 11th in power points out of 29 teams in Class B shows that they have had pretty good success, but played their toughest matchups this week. Coach Mark Gueswell led his team to second in the state duals tournament, and then ended up having two placers in the state championships as Braydon Power and Parker Ablott placed fifth in number two doubles and Moritz Kaufmann won the number two singles championship.
“[Coach Gueswell]’s always in a good mood and he’s always energetic, so it really helps,… when you have a coach that is positive all the time and encouraging you all the time, but will get on you if you’re doing something wrong or you’re in your head, it’s always helpful because you always have someone to lift you up even if the rest of the team doesn’t,” Power said.
The Tigers’ seniors have made a huge impact on this team as only one starter will return next season. Twins Ben and Alex Hafer, Braydon Power, Conner George, and foreign exchange student Moritz Kaufmann all have started for the Tigers during this late part of the season and will all move on after this year. These players worked very hard this season and ended up doing very well in their last two competitions of the season.
“Knowing it’s my last season, and knowing that it’s a lot of the players’ last season, it definitely makes a huge difference that I don’t have much [time] left, “ Ben Hafer said.
