Tennis Team Begins to Emerge

by Mr. Feeny

There’s no doubt that while we here at Hendricken have come to expect our students to strive to do their best in all endeavors, success on the athletic fields, courts, tracks, and rinks has come to be, to a certain extent, expected. There’s also no doubt, however, that while our student-athletes strive to win in their respective contests, there are certain sports with which the Hawks and championships and championship contention have become synonymous – namely, football, basketball, hockey, swimming, wrestling, and baseball.

While our baseball team is once again dominating the competition and headlines during this spring season (9-0, with most of the games having been brought to Hawk Nation LIVE, right here on The Network), there’s another squad that is slowly but surely beginning to push for a share of the headlines – Coach Crawford’s tennis team.

Coach Crawford returned to the tennis sidelines last season, after a number of years away from coaching the game he loves. By his own admission, he knew that the team he had going into last season probably would not compete in the sense of any expectation of winning; obviously, however, the kids played hard for him. It was a very young and inexperienced team, something that showed more and more as the season unfolded.

Coming into this season, Mr. Crawford had slightly higher expectations. With a year of varsity experience under the belts of many of his players, and with the addition of two very talented freshman in Chad Doorley and Aditya Kini, Mr. Crawford was cautiously optimistic that his team would show some development and begin to compete at a more legitimate level.

“Chad and Aditya have the potential to be two of the best tennis players to have ever come through Hendricken,” Coach Crawford said. “They have that kind of ability. They already play the #1 and #2 sets as freshman. What’s even better is that they both love the game merely for the sake of the game and want to continue to improve.”

Coach Crawford also praised the character of all his players, saying that they’re all great kids and a pleasure to be around. He also pointed to the leadership of senior Adeeb Komari, whom he calls a “great captain” and a player who has produced as the team’s #1 doubles player. Sophomore Mike Bittner is a player who also came up in the conversation, because according to Mr. Crawford, “all he does is win.” In fact, while the Hawks are now coming off a very tough-luck 4-3 loss to Smithfield (one of the better teams in the state) last night, Mr. Crawford still took the proverbial ‘moral victory’ from the contest because his team has several match-point opportunities to put the Sentinels away but just couldn’t convert.

Situations like this are no doubt all part of the experience and maturation process for a young, developing, and talented team. It was Mike Bittner’s match, however, that was so hotly contested that it didn’t finish until 7:45, under the lights, with everybody gathered around his court to watch the outcome. As the Smithfield coach said to Coach Crawford following the match, “nobody wants to play you guys in the playoffs.”

As noted above, the Hawks were cautiously optimistic as the season opened about progress. Even though our guys started the season 0-3, the improvement for which Coach Crawford had been looking suddenly appeared, as the young Hawks have gone 6-2 since and have vaulted themselves into a possible favorable playoff position.

The Network carried the home match against Barrington, the majority of which can be seen right here:

While the loss to Smithfield may have been disappointing, it certainly was not disastrous; the Hawks are 6-5 and close out the regular schedule with matches against LaSalle and Cumberland (both of whom they’ve already beaten) before finishing up with South Kingstown, a team that, according to Mr. Crawford, is “in its own league”. Even the Rebels, though, have had to fight to beat our guys.

Tomorrow afternoon, Thursday May 7th, will be a huge rivalry afternoon out on the Hendricken fields, as archrival LaSalle will be here to meet up with the Hawks on the baseball field (4 pm), while the tennis teams square off on the courts at 3:30. The Network’s tentative plan is to bring both contests LIVE to Hawk Nation in a double broadcast, with baseball in one viewer and tennis in the other. What would be even better, though, would be to see a good crowd down there to get behind both Hawks’ squads when they go up against the Maroon.