STURGIS — The Sturgis tennis team opened its season by hosting some of the better teams across the state on Thursday.
The annual Great 8 was held at Augspurger Courts, this year it was won by Bloomfield Hills Cranbrook Kingswood with 23 points. Cranbrook is one of the best tennis school programs in Michigan regardless of school division size. Holland Christian and Ann Arbor Greenhills finished in a tie for second place, both posting 16 team points.
Sturgis scored five team points, finishing in a tie with Grand Rapids West Catholic. East Grand Rapids (13), Ada Forest Hills Eastern (11) and St. Joseph (7) all competed at the annual event as well.
It’s expected that each of the teams which competed will make it to the state finals once again.
Five flights for Sturgis each finished with one victory on the day.
At first singles, Simon Phillips defeated Kyle Carpenter of Grand Rapids West Catholic by scores of 6-2, 6-2. Phillips dropped matches to Andrew Owings of East Grand Rapids and Emerson Chiodini of Forest Hills Eastern.
Second singles saw Carter Oswald pick up a 2-6, 6-3 and 10-7 win over Donevin Ruchti of St. Joseph in three sets. Oswald dropped matches to Dylan Becksvoort of Holland Christian and Emmit Mast of Forest Hills Eastern.
Cooper Barkby won over Jack Johanski of St. Joseph in three sets. His victory came with scores of 4-6, 7-6 and 10-6 as he came from one set down to win. Barkby dropped matches to Tai Singal of Greenhills and Asher Pereira of East Grand Rapids.
Alex Cypher and Seth Larimer won a match at second doubles. That came over Maksym Zimmerman and Alex Devries of Grand Rapids West Catholic in a three-set match at 6-4, 4-6 and 10-8. The Sturgis pair fell in matches to AJ Bacolor/Henry Smith of St. Joseph and Jack Dockery/Elliott Murray of East Grand Rapids.
Fourth doubles saw the Sturgis team of Kellen Meyer and Brayden Bibb pick up a win over Gus Bernreuter and Anthony Maslanka of Grand Rapids West Catholic in three sets at 6-1, 2-6 and 13-11 in the third. The SHS duo dropped matches to Conner Quigg and Patrick Houlihan of East Grand Rapids plus a match against Royal Seale and Evan Chung of Greenhills.
Brody Currier fell to Patrick Latching of Grand Rapids West Catholic (6-3, 2-6, 10-4) and Logan Southern of St. Joseph (6-3, 1-6, 10-4), both matches went the distance in three sets. Currier was also upended by Henry Seufert of East Grand Rapids.
At first doubles, the Sturgis duo of Andrew Scheske and Easton Barkby fell in matches to Cole Kirschenbaum and Ryan VanDyke of Cranbrook Kingswood; Jake Overbeek and Nick Christopher of Grand Rapids West Catholic and the duo of Henry Elms and Brenden Kozal of Forest Hills Eastern.
In third-doubles play, the Sturgis team of Andrew Cypher and Dominic Brown fell in matches to Evan Disselkoen/Eli Whitemore of Holland Christian; Luke Latching/Lucas Shultz of Grand Rapids West Catholic and the team of Ben Hosbein/Wyatt Milletics of St. Joseph in straight sets.
Contact Sports Editor Brandon Watson at bwatson@gannett.com. Follow him on X, formerly known as Twitter, @BwatsonSJ.
This article originally appeared on Sturgis Journal: Sturgis tennis hosts annual Great 8 Invitational, finishes with five points
Reporting by Brandon Watson, Sturgis Journal / Sturgis Journal
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