Columbus North’s Parth Shah returns a shot in the No. 2 singles match in the boys tennis regional final against Seymour Wednesday at Columbus North High School.
Now the real postseason begins for the Columbus North boys tennis team.
After blanking the opposition during the sectional and regional rounds, the fifth-ranked Bull Dogs face their first ranked opponent in No. 20 Cathedral in the semistate round Saturday at Center Grove.
“Cathedral is one of the top-ranked (teams) in the state, so we’ll definitely have to work our butts off,” North senior No. 1 singles player Hank Lin said.
The Bull Dogs will be the favorite heading into Saturday’s match.
“Semistate, we’re looking forward to taking care of business there and then hopefully making the state tournament,” senior No. 2 singles player Parth Shah said.
North, sitting at 19-1 on the season, has never played Cathedral in the postseason, according to coach Kendal Hammel.
Hammel did have the opportunity to look at some of the Irish scores from the regular season.
“They’re good in singles and weak in doubles,” Hammel said. “Their doubles are definitely their weak spots. From what I’ve seen in results from some of their other matches, I think we’re going to be stronger in the doubles, but we still have to come out and play.”
Should the Bull Dogs prevail, they would take on the winner between No. 15 South Bend Saint Joseph and Western in the state quarterfinals at noon Friday at North Central.
If North makes it to the semifinals, it likely would meet up with top-ranked Brebeuf Jesuit, which defeated No. 3 and defending state champion Carmel 3-2 in the regional semifinals.
The draw is favorable for the Bull Dogs to make it to the semifinal round, but Hammel wants his team take it one match at a time.
“We looked at the draw in the long run, and we got, finally, a nice draw,” Hammel said. “But we have to take care of business at regional, at semistate and that first round at state. We know what’s ahead of us, and we can’t look ahead down the road, but we have some possibilities here to do very well this year. It’s one match at a time. We did it for regional, and now, we have to look at semistate.”
