After six singles matches and three doubles matches against Pingree, Andover Boys Tennis remains undefeated with a sweeping victory. The team’s record now stands at 4-0.
Going into the game, the team worked on aggressive play, and was confident in its ability to compete with Pingree, according to Co-Captain Aidan Burt ’21.
“We had a great game against Worcester Academy the week before, so I think we were primarily focused on keeping up good practice habits and working on constructing points. We’re working a lot on being aggressive, but I think that’s something we had been doing really well in the past. So, as a team, I think we were really confident heading into this [game] as well,” Burt said.
Harry Murphy ’24, who won 8-4 in his singles match, agreed with Burt, while noting that the team somewhat expected the match’s result.
Murphy said, “We were very confident and looking forward to having fun. At the end, we were happy with the result; it was what we expected.”
Despite Andover’s sweep, Burt, who won 8-0 in his doubles match, believes that the team needs to continue working on consistency as well as its patience during matches.
Burt said, “I think that consistency is a big key for all of us and [we need to make] sure that we are diligent with that in practice [by] focusing on constructing points. Being patient is something that everyone on the team can work on and benefit from.”
According to Jeremy Liao ’24, the team should consider focusing on their mental game, but is doing a great job competing and securing victories.
“I think… our mental game is something that we might need to focus a little bit on. Overall, I think that we’re doing pretty well,” Liao said.
According to Kian Burt ’24 and Murphy, Liao played aggressively in his singles match and doubles match with Eddie Wang ’24, leading to favorable outcomes for Andover.
Kian Burt said, “I think Jeremy played really well. I think this was his second singles match of the season… He was on the court right next to me and it was going really well because he was able to keep his balls aggressive and keep them consistently in the corners.”
Murphy added, “I want to shout out Eddie and Jeremy quickly because they only lost one point in their doubles match which is really impressive. They almost swept them, but it’s okay it was still super impressive.”
Although Murphy has been battling with a sprained wrist for the past weeks, he was able to play against Pingree and transitioned well in his first varsity single match, according to Aidan Burt.
Aidan Burt said, “For a special shoutout, I’d say Harry, he’s our number eight, but he got the chance to play for his first actual varsity singles match. He had been struggling with a wrist injury, he sprained it and was out for a couple weeks and then came back recently. He was able to play for a win in our game a couple days ago, so I think that was important to him.”
Andover will play Belmont Hill this upcoming Friday and Phillips Exeter Academy this Saturday.
