RHS tennis takes 5th at GNC meet

MINOCQUA — Entering the season Rhinelander High School girls’ tennis coach Matt Nichols said he was hopeful 2024 would be a rebound year for a program that has been historically strong in the Great Northern Conference. Ultimately, however, the cards were stacked against the Hodags in a season that may have been the deepest for talent across the board in the GNC. 

The end result was that Rhinelander finished as a middle of the pack team in the GNC, placing fifth in the conference meet Thursday hosted by Lakeland Union High School in Minocqua. Rhinelander finished fifth overall in the eight-team league as well after sitting in fifth through the dual meet portion of the conference season.

That marked Rhinelander’s lowest finish in league play since joining the GNC in 2010. The Hodags had finished first or second every season until slipping to third last year. 

Rhinelander dropped two more spots this year and, after a bevy of individual fourth-place finishes on Thursday, failed to have any representatives on the all-conference list for the first time as a member of the GNC. 

“It’s not the result we wanted, but it was kind of expected following the regular season duals,” Nichols said. 

The Hodags won five of their seven opening round matches, but went winless the rest of the day to be shut out of all-conference recognition. The top three finishers in each flight at the conference tournament make the all-GNC list. 

Rhinelander’s closest call came at No. 1 singles where senior Kelsey Winter fell 10-7 in a match tiebreaker to Wausau Newman’s Evelyn Herdrich in the third-place match. Winter avenged a loss to Medford’s Audrey Ruesch earlier in the week with a convincing 6-0, 6-2 win in the opening round before falling to top seed, and eventual conference champion, Sarah Barton of Lakeland 6-3, 6-0 in the semifinals. 

That was a common theme for the Hodag players who made it out of the first round. Karmen Lopez took fourth at No. 2 singles, falling 6-4, 7-5 to Wausau Newman’s Addie Schmidt in the third-place match. Sam Aschenbrenner was fourth at No. 4 singles, suffering a 6-4, 6-2 loss to Wausau Newman’s Brechlyn Lindner who pulled off the upset of the tournament earlier in the day — coming in as an 8-seed and knocking off top-seeded Ellie Baker of Lakeland in a match tiebreaker. 

Over in doubles, Rhinelander’s top tandem of Dawsyn Barkus and Brooke Sisel rallied from down a set to win a second-set tiebreaker, and then the match tiebreaker 10-6, to get past Pacelli’s Anabelle Arnold and Regan Abel and into the semifinals. From there they lost to Marshfield Columbus’s Maria Elizabeth Garcia and Akosua Yeboah before falling to Lakeland’s Kristina Ouimette and Ali Timmerman in the third-place match. 

Rhinelander also finished fourth at No. 3 doubles where the team of Eva Heck and Willow VanDenHeuvel beat Phillips in the opening round before suffering losses against Lakeland and Wausau Newman. 

“I think we had some good strokes and nice hustle out there,” Nichols said. “I think, mindset-wise, maybe we were not as locked in because we knew the team score was not going to be affected by those matches. Also, we faced a good opponent who was looking at team score and really needed to get some wins. They played some good tennis and were able to get the wins.”

The extra point for third place did loom large in the team standings as Herdrich’s win over Winter was enough for Wausau Newman to hold off Pacelli by a single point for second in the final overall standings — even though Pacelli outscored Newman 26-23 on the day. Lakeland won the meet with 29 points and took its second straight conference title with 113 total points. 

As for Rhinelander, there was not much movement on the day. The Hodags entered Thursday four points behind Medford for fourth and were outscored by the Raiders 13-10 in the tournament. Aschenbrenner came in as the team’s highest seed, earning a three-seed at the No. 4 singles flight. Otherwise everybody else came in as a No. 4 or 5 seed. 

That didn’t bode well for the two Hodag entries that didn’t make it out of the opening round. Maddie Legrey, the fourth-seed at No. 3 singles, lost 6-1, 6-2 to Wausau Newman’s Emma Larrain. Evelyn Sawyer and Maya Patrick also fell as a four seed at No. 2 doubles, losing in straight sets to Pacelli’s Samantha Schoepke and Reagan Abel, 6-2, 6-4.  

“I think No. 2 doubles was probably the most surprising, considering the regular season scores,” Nichols noted. “Not that it’s an excuse, but we had some illnesses kind of going through the team and Evelyn was out the last two days, no practice.”

While Thursday marked a low-water point for the Hodags in terms of performance within the Great Northern Conference, Nichols said he is still optimistic about the future, especially considering the amount of turnover set to take place in the conference next year. 

“We can reflect on the goal we set early which was start a conference streak,” he said. “Obviously, that’s not something in the books this year but, looking at future years, the younger kids and some of these returning varsity players, did they learn enough and improve enough to start a streak next year? It’s not won in one season. It’s won in all the hitting before hand.”

The season is not yet over for the Hodags, who will play their final dual meet this afternoon at Wisconsin Rapids. Nichols said that could be a critical seeding match against a Wisconsin Valley Conference opponent going into next Monday’s WIAA Division 1 subsectional tournament in Rhinelander. 

Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].