Martlets Swept by Rhinos

The martlets traveled to Watertown,CT to take on the always tough team from Taft. Starting with the doubles point, The Rhinos took the early lead in both #1(Liam Hibbard ‘27 and Finn Hocking’26) and #2 doubles(Will Henry ‘26 and Noah Maltby ‘28) and closed them quickly for 8-2 and 8-0 wins respectively. At #3 doubles, Jack Pickett ‘26 and Alex Brown ‘27 were tied at 4-4 when the players all agreed since the doubles point was over, they thought the coaches had pulled them off. This was not the case, but the coaches agreed to call this match as the doubles point had been secured. Moving on to singles, Liam Hibbard ‘27 fought hard against a strong #1 opponent and despite many deuce games, fell 6-3;6-0. Jack Pickett ‘26 also played many deuces in his 6-3;6-2 loss at #6. Will Henry ‘26 had chances to make his match even closer than his respectable 6-2;6-3 score against a solid opponent at #4. Alex Brown ‘27 played his traditional style of consistent play in his 6-1;6-2 loss at #2. The two matches of the day went to Finn Hocking ‘26 and Noah Maltby ‘28. Finn battled hard against an aggressive opponent and nearly won his match. He took the first set 6-4 with his consistent style of play and ran down every ball. After dropping the second set 4-6, they looked to the third set breaker to decide the match. After a 8-3 lead, Finn saw his opponent come out firing to level at 8-8. Despite a match point at 9-8, his opponent rallied for the 12-10 match win. The grit and grace award of the day goes to Noah Maltby ‘28. After going down 2-5 in both sets, Noah battled both of the sets back. 2-5 went to 4-6 in the first set. In the second, he was also down 2-5 but battled it back to 5-5. After having a chance to take the set 7-5, his opponent stepped up and he saw himself in a set breaker. This also went back and forth, with the Taft player pulling out a 6-4;7-6(7-5) win. Nonetheless, Noah fought very hard and played some great tennis in his match. The Martlets look to right the ship on Saturday against Williston at 2:30pm.