Varsity Tennis had two reasons to celebrate Tuesday: Senior Day and the program's first conference championship since 2018.
The Greenies locked up at least a share of the Carolinas Athletic Association title by taking down visiting Asheville School, 7-2.
Michael Drendel ’23 and Sam Ludington ’23 were recognized prior to the match. William Paschall ’24 completed CAA play with a combined 16-0 record at No. 4 singles and No. 2 doubles.
Special thanks to Coach Brenneman for this recap:
The Greenies won the previous outing 7-2, and were 6-1 in conference play heading into the matchup. Asheville School was 0-7.
The Blues’ #1 doubles team of Sasho Yang and Noah Stenov has been strong all year, and they defeated Ben Fedder and Sam Ludington 8-4. The Greenies’ Michael Drendel and William Paschall won comfortably at #2 with an 8-0 win over Hipolito Gonzalez Gerard and Tony Su, and Norwood Byran and Burnam Dubose won 8-4 over the Blues’ Jaden Cho and Jakob Byrne.
In singles, the Greenies won comfortably at lines 3-6: Martin Gonzalez defeated Byrne 6-4 6-0, Paschall defeated Gonzalez Gerard 6-4 6-1, Benjie Bernstein defeated Su 6-1 6-4, and Bryan defeated Cho 6-0 6-0. At #2, the Blues’ Sasho Yang defeated Burnam Dubose 6-0 6-3.
Even though the match was in hand, #1 singles proved to be a thriller. Michael Drendel and Noah Stenov, both seniors, had met three times previously. Drendel won in 2021 in three sets, but Stenov won both meetings in 2022 (in matches that ended up being 5-4 victories for Asheville School). Stenov started strongly and won the first set 6-2. But just like the earlier meeting against Yang, Drendel rallied in the second set and took it 6-4, leading to the deciding third-set tiebreaker, which Drendel, on his Senior Night, won 10-5, capping off the 7-2 win for the Greenies.
With the victory, Christ School moves to 7-1 in conference, guaranteeing at least a share of the CAA title. They await the results of Carolina Day, who plays home and away against Rabun Gap later this week.