On a muggy Wednesday, Albemarle’s boys tennis team took the Commonwealth District’s top squad to the brink, nearly forcing a playoff for the district regular season championship.
Riverbend prevailed however, dispatching the Patriots with a narrow 5-4 victory to win the Commonwealth District title outright.
But Albemarle didn’t go away easily. Riverbend grabbed a 3-2 lead in the first five singles matches, with the Patriots’ Jake Brooks and Taylor Walker winning at the fifth and sixth spots on the ladder 10-1. But Riverbend managed wins at the three and four spots with Blaise Shuster and Ryan Troung winning for the Bears.
At the number one slot, Riverbend’s Eric Ciccone defeated Timmy Shaw, leaving just one singles match to be decided, the number two spot between Ian Howdyshell and Albemarle’s Doug Corbett.
The match see-sawed back and forth, eventually moving to a tie-break. Howdyshell grabbed a 6-3 lead in the tiebreak, but Corbett valiantly bounced back and closed the gap to 6-5. Howdyshell stopped the bleeding though and closed out the match 7-5.
That gave the Bears a sizeable advantage going into doubles, needing to win just a single match to seal up the district title. They got it at No. 2, with Shuster and Troung combining for a 10-8 victory. Shaw and Corbett won at No. 1 doubles while Brooks and Joey Michel won at No. 3.
Albemarle enters the Commonwealth District tournament as the No. 2 seed, with the quarterfinals starting Friday. The Patriots will host the first round match at 5 p.m.
