FARGO, N.D. (NewsDakota.com) – The Fargo South Bruins won both doubles matches and one of two singles matches to claim a 3-2 win over Valley City in the consolation semifinals of the East Region Boys Tennis tournament Thursday afternoon.

Blake Triebold and Seth Zeltinger won at #1 and #2 singles respectively. Triebold defeated Gannon Steffes in straight sets 6-2, 6-1. Blake’s season record is now 11-2. He will be the #3 seed in singles when the individual region tournament begins today at West Fargo Sheyenne.

Seltinger lost the first set to Aaron Wilkinson, but came back to win in three sets 3-6, 6-3, 6-1. Seth will be a #8 seed in singles today and will play his match at Discovery Middle School.

Here are the results from Thursday’s match and Coach Nielson’s comments.

VC 2
South 3
Singles:
1. Blake Triebold defeated Gannon Steffes 6-2, 6-1
2. Seth Zeltinger defeated Aaron Wilkinson 3-6, 6-3, 6-1
3. Ethan Bear lost to Anthony Erickson 6-2, 6-4

Doubles:
1. Kai Kringlie/Derek Bear lost to Chase Bry/Aiden Bourke 6-2, 7-6(8)
2. Alex Rogelstad/Miles Taylor lost to Michael Greensteiner/Tanner Kirkby 6-1, 6-3

Thoughts:

We finished the team season playing some good tennis.

Blake played solid again today. He opened up his game and had several points where he hit drop shots or had some sweet half volleys for winners. Blake ran his record today to 11-2 in singles heading into the singles individual tournament where he earned the #3 seed. He plays at Sheyenne High tomorrow in his opening match.

Seth lost the first set, but bounced back and won in three sets. He served better and was more consistent in set #2 and #3. In the third set, his opponent became frustrated and Seth just plugged away and let his opponent beat himself. Great job recognizing what your opponent is doing and play accordingly. Seth is seeded #8 in the singles individual tournament and plays at Discovery Middle School in his first round match.

Ethan played two excellent doubles matches where the feet, the belief, the shot selection were all top notch on Monday and Tuesday. Today in singles, he didn’t find that groove. To steal a phrase from Yogi Berra – it is 90 percent mental with the other half physical. Ethan pushed balls up the middle and short and his opponent made him pay. We all have been there as players Ethan. You will grow from this experience. You never gave up even though your game wasn’t where you wanted it to be. You have at least two doubles matches tomorrow with Max in the individuals tournament to play like you want to. Go get ‘em!

Kai and Derek played Fargo South’s #1 and #4 players. About halfway through the second set is when the match turned ridiculous. We were down 5-2 and then we played loose. Derek was smacking approach shots and putting balls away at the net. Kai was hitting very angled cross court and consistent. Both were attacking the net and putting away overheads and volleys. We got up 6-5 in the second set when I think we realized we were winning. We then hit two returns out leading tying the match at 6-6 going into the tiebreaker. In the breaker, we were down 6-2 and had four match points against us – we loosened up and played great points to get us to 6-6. We saved two more match points at 6-7 and 7-8 before loosing 8-10. We were underdogs in this match and we fought off 6 match points! Derek and Kai are the #10 seeds in the doubles draw tomorrow and they will need to beat a team similar to this one to state qualify. You proved you are capable – let’s do it tomorrow and Saturday! The doubles draw is at Courts Plus.

Alex and Miles were not supposed to be in the line-up today as of 7am this morning, but when 2020 hits, you got to be ready and we have to have a next person up mentality. Alex and Miles played a little tentative in the first set, standing up on shots and not moving between shots. They started playing like underdogs (which they were) and both stepped into shots and hitting solid cross court. Both put volleys away and attacked the net. Great work both of you to step into today’s match and to give your all. Thank you! Alex will play tomorrow in the singles tournament at 1pm at Discovery.

If you would have asked at the start of the season if any of us thought that we would make it to the regional tournament with every school still participating and having every match played, we would have all said impossible! Even though our season ended short of state qualifying and we had some bumps along the way with 2020, we still had a season. We are all thankful for this. I want to thank our community and our fans for the support as well. Everyone listened and followed our guidelines so we could continue to play. All the other EDC coaches, players, and fans also did a great job. It was easy to work with all of the coaches and we all adapted together. The fans from other schools followed our guidelines to a T. We are all in this together and the North Dakota tennis community proved that we can do this together.

Buckle up for an interesting individuals tournament Friday and Saturday! We have so much parody in the EDC that anything can happen. Here we go!