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Marietta Tigers get competitive in district tennis tournament

Marietta High’s Mason Cline competes during SE District doubles competition in the second round at the Ohio Unversity Golf & Tennis Center Saturday. He and teammate Mason Cline won a first-round match but bowed out in the second round. Photo by Ron Johnston.

ATHENS — Tyler Wise and Mason Cline teamed to up to win a D2 district opening-round doubles match at the Ohio University Golf & Tennis Center Saturday morning.

The two Marietta High seniors, however, bowed out of the tennis tournament in the afternoon.

“That’s probably going to be our easiest match of the day,” said Cline after he and Wise bested West Holmes’ Jason Abraham and Jake Mullet, 6-2-and 6-0. “Our next two are looking pretty tough. They’re going to be pretty close matches.”

In district singles competition, both Marietta’s Eric Delong and Jacob Freeland went one-and-done.

“They were playing tough opponents,” said MHS head coach Chris Mayer of his singles players. “I mean, there’s nothing wrong with losing those matches. They played hard. Sometimes you win and sometimes you lose.”

“They’re both juniors, and they’ll both be back next year. It’s been a good experience for them.”

That was one thing (experience) that Wise had working for him in the doubles battles. Last year, he and Tiger Jack Hu lost in the first round at district.

“I think we got beat by Cambridge,” recalled Wise. “But this year, we won our first match and got to advance.”

“We kind of got off to a slow start a little bit (in the first round Saturday),” Wise said. “But we were able to get it together.”

Cline agreed, and added. “Improvise. Whenever the ball comes to you, you look around and you see what’s available — and then you take advantage of that.”

Wise and Cline got off to a shaky beginning in the second round, too, dropping their first four games to Clay’s Nate Hinze and Gage Keller in the opening set. The Panther duo had a bye in the first round.

“Every team here is good,” Wise said. “And on any given day, you know.”

Wise and Cline rallied, though, to cut it to 4-3 and then 5-4 before falling 6-4.

In the second set, the Tiger twosome trailed 1-0 but again came back to tie it, 1-1. Then, there was about a half-hour rain delay.

When play was resumed, Wise and Cline took their first lead in the second round, 2-1, and then won three of the next four games in the set to take a commanding 5-2 advantage.

All the orange and black netters needed was one more win in games to even the count in the best-of-three sets format.

But it was not forthcoming as Hinze, a Shawnee State University tennis recruit and Keller, a freshman, rallied to win five consecutive games to win the set, 7-5, and the match.

In singles, Delong was downed by East Liverpool’s Alex Tambellini, 7-5 and 6-2.

“He was a different opponent than what I’m used to,” Delong said. “It’s hard to play against a server who’s a top spinner. He had more slice under the ball, and it doesn’t bounce as high when I practice with Jacob (Freeland). It’s different, and I also just kind of played inconsistent out there.”

Freeland was also swept, 6-2 and 6-3, by Waverly’s Branden Nibert.

“He’s a great player,” Freeland said. “But I thought I played pretty well. There’s always next season. I’ll be working hard this summer.”

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