My Top High School Sports Moment

I would like to start off all of my viewers that read my blog. Most notably, the viewers that have been reading my Top 10 High School Sports Moments. I was going strong through number 4, until I ran into more US Open coverage, personal issues and school issues. Then I took some time off this segment as it was my most time consuming. But here I am and ready to finish it off. Here are my top 10 in order so far:

10. Perry vs. Lakeside Football Game (Senior Year)
9. Perry vs. Madison Basketball Game (Sophomore Year)
8. Wrestling
7. Winning the CVC Tennis Tournament for my 4th and Final Time
6. Winning the CVC Team Tournament as a Freshman
5. Burning the Jersey: Beating Geneva in the 2013 Tennis Season
4. 2011 Regional Cross Country Meet
3. All 3 State Appearances
2. 2012 Regional Cross Country Meet
1. ?????

Any last guesses? No?

Well my favorite Top High School Sports Moment is when I won the Intramural Basketball Championship in 11th grade....wait a minute. That's not it. My Top High School Sports Moment is when we beat Chagrin 3 times in a row in cross country my sophomore year to move onto regionals...wrong again. How about watching the Riverside vs. Perry basketball game in 10th grade? Nope. Beating Aurora in tennis my freshman year at their home courts? No again.

(If you didn't catch on those were my honorable mentions)

My Top High School Sports Moment brings us to a cold day in Canton, Ohio my senior year to the district tennis tournament. This was the tournament to qualify for State, and we had to win our first 2 to get there. As the 3 seed out of the Brush Sectional, which everyone knew was the toughest sectional in doubles for our district.

Upon the draws being released, we were very happy with our draw. We would play the 2 seed out of the Rocky River sectional first (Vermillion) and then most likely the 1 seed from the Wooster sectional (Norton). 

Districts was a very neat experience, as Dan and I went down a day early to stay in a hotel with Mr. and Mrs. Walker. We went to the park where we were playing as well and got a practice session in.

So it was the day of Districts and in the hotel we ate breakfast with Jake Groce (my good friend mentioned in the Geneva tennis story) and the Geneva coaches and then we set off to the courts. It was freezing there but there wasn't much we can do. After arriving to the courts, we were the first match on. We displayed our new uniforms which were sweet, even though it was 40 degrees. We played through the cold though and unfortunately got down 3-0 early. We weren't playing good at all, but after a change of ends we turned it on and won the next 12 games to beat Vermillion 6-3, 6-0. We were now into the qualifying round and were set to play Norton. The Norton team consisted of a guy who played USTA tourneys and just tried to hit every ball as hard as possible, and a tall partner.

The nerves were now as big as ever as we walked onto the court to play Norton. This match stood between me and Dan becoming the first doubles team in school history to get to state. Pretty much, this match was what we worked for since we started playing tennis. It all came down to this.

We had a fan section consisting of both of our families, Jake and all of the Geneva fans, and Christian Fatica who made the drive down. We unfortunately didn't have any of our other classmates here because it was our last day of school (so me and Dan played hooky on our last ever day of high school).

The match started off in Norton's control as they had some big serving early. Dan and I rallied back to go ahead in the first set, but were then countered once Norton took the first set 6-4. I will never forget hearing Norton's cheering section (not kidding consisting of 50 people) star cheering and be loud after that. That was a shot to the stomach.

The second set came around and me and Dan got off to a sluggish start getting down 3-2. I will never forget the changeover at that point. I remember Mr. Walker talking to me and Dan and things weren't looking good. I stood there freezing, just thinking if we lose the next 3 games we can get out of the cold. At that point I also started thinking, maybe getting to State wasn't meant to be. Looking back, those were terrible thoughts, but oddly enough maybe the thoughts I needed. After that, me and Dan came out to win the next 4 games and take the 2nd set 6-3.

We were pumped and ready to go for the 3rd set at that point. Dan and I both cam out hot in the 3rd set, going up 4-1 and 40-love. As much as I love Dan, I will never forget this next point. I believe he set it up perfectly so he got an easy overhead, which he missed. And that was arguably Dan's best shot, which was even more shocking. Norton came back and won that game and tied it up at 4-4. At 4-4, it was my serve and we were up 40-30, lost the next two points and faced a game point. I then served down the middle and hit my first ace of the match (good timing). We won that game and went up 5-4. We were only 1 game away from a state berth. That was it. 4 points. It was Kyle May's turn to serve (the guy who hit everything as hard as he could). Dan hit a few great shots, and Kyle double faulted twice and we had our first match point to go to state. Kyle would serve to me on the add side. He double faulted often throughout the match, so I was honestly hoping this would happen again. He missed his first serve. I then crossed my fingers again. His second serve came in and I missed my shot wide. I knew if we would lose, that point would come back to haunt me. Kyle then double faulted again to give us another match point. Flashback....one of the reasons why I liked playing the add side in doubles because I liked the pressure associated with either finishing a game off, or keeping a game alive. Or in this case, clinching our spot at state. So I reflected on that as Kyle missed his first serve again. The second serve came in and I winded up and nailed a forehand down the line and the Norton player at the net missed the volley into the net. Me and Dan looked at each other without realized what happened. We were going to state! We started screaming and heard our whole fan section and we hugged Mr. Walker. It was unreal we actually did it. Everything we had worked for paid off. Walking off that court and hearing all of the congratulations. All the picture taking. My phone blowing up with texts. It was one of the best feelings ever.

In spite of all of this, we still had to come back the next day to play for the seeding. As projected, the Brush sectional got all 4 spots out of our district. So after the hot tub at the hotel and a nice steak dinner, we were back at it the next day. In the semifinals, we lost to US (my friends Robby Stroup and Clay Hribar). After that, Dan and I got interviewed by the Cleveland Plain Dealer. This would be my first, as I later got interviewed by the News-Herald and Star Beacon at later dates. We lost the 3rd place match but nonetheless we got to state!

Here are some articles and pictures from this:


http://www.news-herald.com/general-news/20130530/high-school-tennis-perry-duo-makes-history-with-state-run?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

http://highschoolsports.cleveland.com/news/article/5209667242585354909/quartet-of-ne-ohio-doubles-teams-dominate-div-ii-district-tennis/

Thank you for following my blog and my Top High School Sports Moments. Keep Frying that Chicken!