Pony tennis duo brings home medals from state

Doubles has been a strength for the Havre High tennis teams for a long time now. And, on the final weekend of the 2019 season, it was yet again.

Ten Blue Ponies made their way to last week's Class A state tennis tournament in Kalispell, and for the third consecutive year, a Havre boys doubles team came home with Class A All-State honors.

Senior Tommy Brown and junior Tyrel Kjersem, fresh off a Central A championship two weeks ago, made a great run in Kalispell, reaching the boys doubles semifinals Thursday before falling to Hardin's Jonathan and Ben Noteboom Friday morning. However, the duo bounced back to win twice Friday to capture third-place honors, and score 10 of Havre's 11 points, which put the Ponies fifth in the final team standings.

"What a special last two days for Tommy and Tyrel," HHS head coach George Ferguson said. "I'm just so proud of them. They played great tennis; they played great doubles. They played the best tennis of their lives when it mattered the most, and that's not an easy thing to do. I'm so happy for Tommy, he's been a great player for four years, he was our senior leader this season, and he is able to say he won his last-ever high school tennis match. And Tyrel, I can't say enough about what he did this season. Tommy was a new partner for him. That's not easy to switch partners, but Tyrel really stepped up. He's such a talented player, and he played amazing this whole postseason. I'm really proud of him, and those two together, they made a great run."

A great run indeed. The duo opened the state tourney Thursday morning with a dominant, 6-1, 6-0 win over Glendive, then, in the quarterfinals, they took down a team from Columbia Falls that had lost just once all season long going into the match. That set the Pony tandem up with yet another meeting with the Notebooms, a team that Havre had seen plenty of this season, and a team that was picked as the favorite to win the Class A doubles title. Jonathan Noteboom played against Havre's Trey Murphy and Kennedy McKay in the state final a year ago, while younger brother Ben is a sophomore. And while Brown and Kjersem didn't quite get over the hump in a 6-3, 6-4 loss Friday morning, Ferguson said his team did all they could to reach the championship match.

"Jon and Ben are a really strong team," Ferguson said. "And we know that because we've played them about a 1,000 times this year it feels like. But Tommy and Ty gave them everything they could handle. That match was super-close, and it could have gone the other way just as easily. But what I was so impressed with was how our guys handled it. They came off the court with their heads held high and determined to keep going forward. That's not easy to do after you know you're not going to win a state championship. So I was really proud of them for that."

And Brown and Kjersem certainly pushed on. In the consolation semifinals, they demolished a strong team from Corvallis, 6-0, 6-3, advancing to the consolation final where they faced off against Whitefish' Mark Anderson and Colton Upton, who had suffered their first loss of the entire season just hours earlier in the other semifinal. And in what was the last match of the season for the Blue Ponies, they were again spectacular. In a tightly-contested battle, Brown and Kjersem handed the Bulldogs a 6-4, 7-6 (7-5) loss, giving the Ponies third-place honors, and yet more hardware for the HHS doubles dynasty.

"That match was just a really good match," Ferguson. "That Whitefish team is very talented. They're big servers and good at the net. So it was a tough match, but Tommy and Ty just weren't going to be denied. They were so tough in that match, especially mentally, and they played what I think is the best match of their entire careers. They were just really on, played at such a high level and played so well together, that, they just weren't going to let it get away from them.

"Again, I'm just so proud of those two," Ferguson said. "They really rose to a whole new level this last two weeks. They were exactly what the finish says, simply one of the very best doubles teams in all of Class A, and I'm so happy for them to see the success they had. It's awesome, and it was honor to coach those two guys. They made Havre High and our program very proud."

As always, Ferguson was very proud of his entire team.

The Havre boys went into the state tournament gunning for a trophy, but things didn't quite work out that way, as Havre couldn't catch state champion Dillon, which swept the singles and doubles titles, or second-place Whitefish and third-place Hardin. Corvallis also just edged the Ponies for fourth.

Individually, sophomore Josh Warp finished his first state tournament with a 1-2 record, including a strong loser-out win over Columbia Falls' Neill Getts. Juniors Jake Huston and Reese Bulkley suffered tough losses to Hardin in the first round, and a three-set heartbreaker to Dillon in the consolation round, but Warp, Huston and Bulkley will be back next season, along with Kjersem, and this weekend's state tourney, certainly laid the groundwork for for the 2020 Pony boys.

"Four of the five guys we took to state will be back," Ferguson said. "I thought, for Josh, Jake and Reese, Kalispell was a great experience. I know they were all disappointed that they didn't go further, but that doesn't mean they didn't play well. They did, and they were not that far off from going deep into that tournament. So, I think that experience will be huge for those three guys moving forward, and, I'm very proud of all of our boys for how they played in Kalispell."

The Havre girls also had five outstanding players in Kalispell last weekend, with the doubles duo of Kadyn and Cassidy Acor advancing the furthest. The Pony tandem lost a tough first-round match to Polson, but rebounded to beat Miles City before being eliminated by a Hardin duo in a three-set thriller Thursday evening.

"Kadyn and Cassidy played great," Ferguson said. "It was their first state tournament, and they were a tiebreaker away from having a shot at a medal. So they have nothing to hang their heads about. They played awesome. It's not easy at state being a first-year team and it being their first state tournament, but they were awesome, they played so well."

So did Havre's senior trio of Marcee Murphy and Devyn Solomon in doubles, and McKenzie Tommerup in singles. Murphy and Solomon, making their second state tourney appearances, lost in the opening round to the eventual runner-up from Polson, before being eliminated in a tough match against Corvallis. In singles, Tommerup fell to eventual semifinalist Tricia Joyce of Butte Central in the opening round, then lost a gut-wrenching three-setter to Libby's top singles player.

"Marcee and Devyn, and McKenzie, those matches were all so close," Ferguson said. "They played so hard, they played really well, and they left it all on the court. You hurt for them, because they're such great kids, great Blue Ponies, and they wanted to win so badly. But at the end of the day, I'm just so proud of all three of those girls, I'm so proud of our entire girls team. They did everything we asked of them, they gave it everything they had, and even though the results weren't what they wanted, it doesn't change the fact that they are all great players, and I'm just so honored to have coached them all.

"And that's really how I feel now that this season is in the books," Ferguson continued. "I feel so honored and so lucky to have been able to take those 10 kids to the state tournament. I'm so proud of the tennis players they are, the student-athletes they are and proud of how they represent Havre High. And that's across the board again this season. The 40 kids we had out for tennis this year, they made it another special year. It was an amazing season from start to finish.

"Our seniors were awesome, they're special and we're going to miss them an awful lot," he added. "But we also have a ton of great kids coming back, great players coming back, and I know we'll have a lot of exciting newcomers, too. So while I'm always a little sad this time of year, because this journey with this year's team is over, I am also so happy to have been a part of that journey with these kids, and I can't wait until next spring when we can do it all over again."

2019 Class A State Tennis

In Kalispell

Boys

Team Scores

Dillon 33, Whitefish 22, Hardin 21, Corvallis 13, Havre 11, Miles City 7, Glendive 5, Columbia Falls 4, Polson 3, Butte Central 3, Livingston 3, Billings Central 2.

Singles final: Bradley Rakich, Dil, def. Brendan Buls, Whi, 6-3, 7-6 (6). Consolation final: Caleb Warnken, Cor, def. Dalton Polesky, MC, 6-3, 6-1.

Doubles final: Mark Southam/Nathaniel Leonardson, Dil, def. Jonathan Noteboom/ Ben Noteboom, Har, 6-7 (5), 6-2, 6-1. Consolation final: Tommy Brown/Tyrel Kjersem def. Mark Anderson/Colter Upton, Whi, 6-4, 7-6 (1).

Havre Individual Results

Tommy Brown/Tyrel Kjersem (3rd Place)

1st rd - def. Lighter/Reinhardt, GLE, 6-1, 6-0; Quarterfinals - def. Gilk/Lingle, CF, 6-3, 6-2; Semifinals - lost to Noteboom/Noteboom, HAR, 6-3, 6-4; Consolation semifinals - def. Liedle/Hubbard, COR, 6-0, 6-3; Consolation Final - def. Anderson/Upton, WF, 6-4, 7-6 (1).

Jake Huston/Reese Bulkley

1st rd - lost to Old Crow/Swisse, HAR, 6-3, 6-3; Consolation 1st rd - lost to Sawyer/Guillen, DIL, 6-3, 1-6, 6-3.

Josh Warp

1st rd - lost to Pottier, COR, 6-2, 7-6 (5); 1st rd consolation - def. Getts, CF, 6-0, 6-3; 2nd rd consolation - lost to Polesky, MC, 6-4, 6-2.

Girls

Team Scores

Whitefish 33, Polson 26, Hardin 19, Livingston 17, Columbia Falls 10, Corvallis 9, Butte Central 5, Billings Central 5, Hamilton 3, Havre 1, Dillon 1, Libby 1, Belgrade 1.

Singles final: Gracie Smyley, Whi, def. Bobbi Lima, Liv, 7-5, 6-3. Consolation final: Hannah Schweikert, CF, def. Shea McGuiness, Pol, 6-0, 6-2.

Doubles final: Aubrey Hanks/Olivia Potthoff, Whi, def. Berkley Ellis/Qia Harlan, Pol, 4-6, 6-1, 6-1. Consolation final: Katie Murdock/Makiko Reisig, Hard, def. Cailei Cummins/Deidra Don't Mix, Hard, 6-0, 6-1.

Havre Individual Results

Kadyn Acor/Cassidy Acor,

1st rd - lost to Mercer/Rost, POL, 6-3, 7-6 (4), 1st rd consolation - def. Flemming/Moore, MC, 6-4, 6-3; 2nd rd consolation - lost to Green/Flamm, HAR, 7-5, 4-6, 7-6 (4).

Marcee Murphy/Devyn Solomon

1st rd - lost to Ellis/Harlan, POL, 6-2, 6-1; 1st rd consolation - lost to Kirkland/Weidkamp, COR, 6-2, 6-3.

McKenzie Tommerup

1st rd - lost to Joyce, BUT, 6-0, 6-2; 1st rd consolation - lost to Wood, LIB, 6-7 (9), 6-1, 6-4.