STAR JOURNAL REPORT

The Rhinelander High School boys tennis team picked up another Great Northern Conference victory last week before entering the Easter weekend by winning one of three matches at an invitational.

On Thursday, the Hodags swept their conference road match at Lakeland Union High School, 7-0.

“Lakeland may not have had a full lineup but the players they had were good,” said RHS head coach Bob Heideman. “We were very fortunate to leave with a 7-0 victory. To win three three-set matches after losing the first set in all of them is extremely rare.”

Those three-set victories for the Hodags included wins at the top-three singles spots with Logan Wild defeating Aaron Petersen in No. 1 singles, 4-6, 6-2, 6-3; Markus Johnson downing Vincent Yu at No. 2 singles, 2-6, 7-6, 6-3; and Russell Benoy beating Matt Holmes at No. 3 singles, 5-7, 6-1, 6-2.

“Early on Logan was plagued with errors, but as the match wore on he got more and more consistent,” Heideman said. “He started to hit some winners off his ground strokes and then he was hard to catch.

“Markus had to do a major shift in his game after losing the first set. He went back to taking pace off the ball and his opponent did the same, which was to Markus’s advantage. Yu started playing Markus’s game.

“Russell added a shot which drew Holmes into the net and that changed things around. He had a much easier time in the second and third sets.”

GBSW INVITE

The Hodags then closed out the week by being able to get in three matches at the weather-shortened invitational hosted by Green Bay Southwest.

“We travel to Green Bay to get the competition and we got plenty of that,” Heideman said.

RHS was swept 7-0 by Southwest and also lost 6-1 to West De Pere, but pulled out a 4-3 victory over Oshkosh North.

Johnson recorded the Hodags’ only victory against West De Pere at No. 2 singles over Quinn Norton, 2-6, 6-1, 14-12.

RHS recorded only one singles match victory against Oshkosh North with Wild winning in straight sets at No. 1 singles over Max Bossert, 6-4, 6-3. The Hodags picked up straight-set victories in all three double matches with Grant Gilbert and Jared Fabich winning at No. 1 doubles, 6-4, 6-2, Connor Young and Jared Haug victorious at No. 2 doubles, 6-3, 7-5, and Russell Benoy and Marshall Bessette getting the win at No. 3 doubles, 6-3, 6-1.

RHS, which is now 2-0 in the GNC and 5-3 overall, has its first home meet of the season Tuesday against non-conference foe Phillips.