The Westside boys tennis team hosted the Warrior invite on Monday, September 30th. Coach Jordane Warkentin said that the warriors’ season has been up and down to this point and with the home court advantage the team was looking for a strong performance to boost their confidence.

“As a team, we didn’t finish as strong as we should have. Although 2 singles (Josh Rosenblatt) and 2 doubles (Josh Siegel & Luke David) finished higher than they have all year, we still struggled to defeat strong teams in 1 singles and 1 doubles,” Warkentin said. “Our invite hosts most of the top teams in the state, so it was a lot of tough competition. We know that we need to work hard in practices in the next few weeks to defeat those teams that we haven’t been able to so far this year.”

Sophomore Josh Rosenblaat won his match 8-1 and Junior Jake Bonnett won two of his three matches over Papillion-La Vista South by a score of 8-4 and an injury defeat over Creighton Prep. With the metro tournament coming up next week and the state tournament the following week, the team is looking to improve. Warkentin said she believes that there are steps that can be taken to better prepare them for the final stretch of the season.

“Tennis is a very difficult sport when it comes to mental toughness on the court. We have a young team, most of whom have not overcome their mental blocks. As a team, we are really going to work hard in practice on overcoming those mental breakdowns on the court and sticking to our strategy and game plan. We will also be emphasizing consistency on the court and working towards better footwork,” Warkentin said.

Warkentin said she is looking for the team to really buckle down for the final stretch of the season and work extremely hard. Since the start of the season, this team has had one goal in mind and that is to finish top 5 at the State Tournament. Warkentin said she still believes they can do it if they just set their minds to it. 

“If we are going to achieve our goal of top 5 teams in the state, we are going to have to play the best we’ve played all year. The guys will need to play with a lot of consistency, playing strategically and supporting each other through the tough matches. We have not given up on our goals for the season. We simply know that we have to overcome the challenges we’ve faced so far against the tougher teams and show everyone that we can achieve our potential,” Warkentin said.

Westside tennis will return on Wednesday, October 9, 2019 when they take on the Metro Conference Tournament.