Last night Bethany played Westview in Topeka. The Warriors had been a tough match for the Bruins since Cameron joined the tennis team four years ago. Cameron assured me that they were down this year and that it would be a lot closer than last year's score. I was hopeful, yet skeptical, as the small, rural school always had good sports teams.
I arrived early tonight and was surprised to see that Westview only had nine players on their team, down quite a bit from years past. As our team was warming up, I started to think that maybe Cameron was right. Maybe we did have a chance at a team victory. As the match started, however, I soon realized that although their team was smaller, they definitely were very good. After the first half hour of play, Cameron and Breece were the only courts with a game win as all of the singles and #2 doubles were down 0-5.
As #1 doubles made the switch at 1-4, I realized that the score didn't quite reflect how well Breece and Cameron were playing. A coupled of double faults and a few too many unforced errors were the difference in the courts' score. Once the boys calmed down, got into a rhythm and figure out how to return their opponent's serve, Breece and Cameron started to win games. In fact they brought the first set score to 4-5, before losing the final game to end at 4-6. Those of us in their fan group were impressed with their play and their comeback.
Cameron and Breece built on that momentum and soon were in the lead in the second set. As the #1 doubles court continued to rally back and forth, more and more Bruins players the spectator bleachers unable to find a victory on their own courts. The two teams at #1 doubles, however, were as closely matched as I had ever seen in my ten seasons of watching high school tennis. We all hoped for that Breece and Cameron could push the match to a third set as it was too much fun watching them play to have it end after two. The boys soon found themselves in a second set tiebreak and easily won 7-4 forcing a third set.
Grandpa took advantage of the break in action to get Grandma and I a bag of popcorn from the soccer match. I was thankful as the match was close to two hours long by that point. The boys rested and talked with Matt during the ten minute intermission. The third set was extremely intense with long rallies, awesome overheads and some incredible shots. Cameron and Breece were up a break at 1-3, but soon Westview made a run and was up a break 5-4. The crowd had grown, the energy was up and the boys held on to force a third set tiebreak. Matt had told them that the most aggressive team would win tonight and to not let down their intensity. He was 100% right as the Westview players went into a conservative mode and Breece and Cameron kept going for winners. The strategy worked and after two hours and fifty minutes, Bethany won the court with a third set tiebreak score of 1-7. Cameron felt really good about tonight as he said that that was the best that he had played this year. Matt posted later that this was one of the closest matches in Bethany history. So incredibly thankful that we got to witness it.
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