Two days after the Maine Principals’ Association released the seeds for the upcoming singles tennis state tournaments, doubles players took center stage.
The Western Maine Conference and the Southern Maine Activities Association both held doubles tournaments, as did the Kennebec Valley Athletic Conference. Instead of spreading the matches over two weekends, as is the case with singles, the conference doubles tourneys last for one day.
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“It’s their time to shine,” said Cape Elizabeth Coach Andy Strout. “We’ve always wanted to get (the different conference finalists) together, but there’s no more (free) weekends.”
So many teams took part in the SMAA boys’ and girls’ doubles tournaments that the winners have yet to be determined. The SMAA girls stopped at the semifinals, and three of the four teams remaining are from Portland High.
“I’d be very surprised if that’s not a record in both the boys’ and girls’ (SMAA) tournaments,” wrote Portland Coach Bonnie Moran, responding to an email query. “We will not be playing the final until Tuesday (weather permitting) because we have a match Monday.”
The SMAA boys — who started with 34 teams — will finish up Wednesday, with Thornton Academy’s unbeaten first doubles team of Justin Pollard and Alex Lambert facing Gorham’s Mike Lubelczyk and Tom Susi. Two weeks ago, Pollard and Lambert rallied to a 3-6, 7-6 (4), 6-3 victory.
On Saturday, both teams required a 10-point tiebreaker to advance after splitting sets in the semifinals — Gorham against Deering, and Thornton against Scarborough.
“Semifinals was the best I’ve seen in 13 years,” Windham Coach Wayne Martin wrote about the quality of play.
The WMC girls, as it always seems to, came down to Falmouth’s top two doubles teams. Defending champions Abby Payson, a junior, and Steffi Rothweiler, a senior, prevailed over teammates Katie Ryan and Marlena Lantos, a sophomore and a senior, respectively, by a score of 6-2, 6-2.
Not only has a team from Falmouth won the WMC girls’ doubles title the past six times weather has cooperated, but the runners-up have hailed from Falmouth in four of the five most recent championships.
The WMC boys played at Waynflete’s Fore River courts, where 13 teams were whittled to four. Both semifinals featured a Cape Elizabeth vs. Falmouth contest.
“You just want the best two teams to play in the final,” Strout said. “And it was the two best teams.”
Capers freshman Luke Gilman and sophomore Eli Breed avenged a straight-set loss to Falmouth’s Tom Wilberg and Sam Holland just a week earlier, winning in a 10-point tiebreaker, 6-4, 3-6, 10-4.
It was the second straight title for a Cape Elizabeth tandem. Junior Sam Sherman, who supplanted Gilman at No. 3 singles, and 2011 graduate Ben Morse won last year.
Strout wasn’t even sure Gilman would join his brother Matt, a junior seeded third in the state singles tournament, on the tennis team until shortly before practices began.
“It was toward the end of the winter season that (Luke) decided to change over from baseball,” Strout said, “which I’m very happy about.”
CHEVERUS, THE DEFENDING Class A baseball state champion, seems to be back on track after a three-game losing streak. The Stags (8-4) have won three straight to stay in contact with the top three teams — Marshwood, Windham and Scarborough — in the Western Class A Heal point standings.
With the regular season winding down, it’s anyone’s guess as to which team will enter the postseason as the No. 1 seed. Marshwood took over the top spot recently.
“All the teams are bunched together,” said Cheverus Coach Mac McKew. “There’s a big group in the middle. We’ll just have to wait to see how it plays out.”
Baseball teams finally got some good weather at the end of last week. Several teams had to play four games to catch up after rainouts. The Stags’ three wins came on successive days. They beat South Portland on Thursday, Portland on Friday and Westbrook 4-3 on Saturday in a matchup of the fourth- and fifth-ranked teams. The day before, Cheverus beat Portland, 3-2.
Having games get backed up is nothing new to high school baseball in Maine. It often takes until late May for the weather to be conducive to baseball.
“Last year we had five games in seven days,” said McKew.
The regional tournament could be wide open. Marshwood has wins over Scarborough and Cheverus, but lost to Windham in a season opener. Cheverus beat Windham early, but has lost to both Scarborough and Marshwood. Scarborough has the best record (11-1) but has had some close games.
And then there’s Westbrook, a young, talented team capable of beating anyone.
— Staff Writers Glenn Jordan and Tom Chard contributed to this report.
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