GREENFIELD — The last two times New Palestine and Greenfield-Central met on the boys tennis courts, things were pretty lopsided.
The Dragons cruised to a county win in 2017 and beat the Cougars head-to-head in a quick 5-0 sweep last season.
Wednesday night was quite a bit different. The Dragons pulled out the win again, 4-1 on the Cougars’ home courts, but saw two different matches go to three sets and a much more competitive match overall.
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New Palestine (2-1) jumped ahead early at every position except No. 3 singles, where the Dragons’ Trevor Darley lost the first set to Greenfield-Central’s Sam Galyean in six games.
While Galyean cruised through the first set, the Dragons picked up quick wins at No. 2 singles and No. 1 doubles.
Not much else came easy from that point. At No. 1 singles, New Palestine’s Matthew True and Greenfield-Central’s Mason Bussel were locked in a back-and-forth first set, which saw True eventually prevail 6-2.
It was a lot closer than that margin would indicate.
“I think everybody played pretty well, to be honest,” Greenfield-Central coach Michael Turpin said. “There’s definitely some fine-tuning we have to do — anybody who watched would know it, if you looked at the scores you know it. But the thing you don’t see is at No. 1 singles, most of Mason’s and True’s games went to deuce.”
The second set went more smoothly for True, as he won his match against Bussel 6-2, 6-0.
It was his 60th varsity tennis win.
“He played pretty well in that first set,” True said. “I just tried to play my game against him, continue to grind. Things just went my way. I was just focused in the second set. I just took it point by point.”
Getting off the court first for New Palestine was Carson Gavin at No. 2 singles. Gavin bested Greenfield-Central’s Steven Roland 6-0, 6-1, giving the Dragons two of the three points they’d need to claim a win.
They’d get the final point needed for a win from the No. 1 doubles duo of Dane Reid and Ben Blachly, who picked up a 6-1, 6-1 win against the Cougars’ Colin Hunt and Seth Kirkpatrick.
With the match officially in hand, attention turned to Darley and Galyean at No. 3 singles, who found themselves in a three-set match after Darley rallied to win the second set 6-2.
The two would battle for over 90 minutes, with Darley eventually completing the comeback and picking up New Palestine’s final point with a 0-6, 6-2, 6-2 win.
It was Darley’s second ever varsity match at singles.
“Trevor’s very coachable,” New Palestine coach Jean Graham said. “We just had to change his gameplan. He was going about it kind of in the wrong way, and we just had to adjust a little bit to get it in his comfort zone. He followed instructions well and he pulled it out. We’re really happy with that win.”
Greenfield-Central’s point came at No. 2 doubles, where Kane Bradley and Robbie Dye completed a comeback of their own, beating New Palestine’s Drew Pieratt and Jeremy Wagoner 1-6, 6-3, 6-4 in a match that lasted nearly two hours.
That result evoked a similar reaction from both coaches.
“I saw a big improvement in our doubles,” Graham said. “Even though we lost at two, it’s a big improvement for them. I saw a lot of positive things that we can work on.”
It’s a big sign of improvement for Greenfield-Central, as well.
“Knowing that if we’re in here rallying with someone that I think is going to be top five in all the teams we’re going to play this year, that gives me another boost of confidence,” Turpin said. “As long as we can work on all the errors we had tonight and certain things I think we need to fine tune, I think we’ll definitely be even more of a force to be reckoned with next time we see them, come county.”
The result didn’t go the way the Cougars wanted, but the battles at several key positions are a step forward from where the program was last year.
The scores alone show that, with Greenfield-Central (2-1) picking up a point, taking another match to three sets and competing hard at No. 1 singles. Graham, who was an assistant for New Palestine the past few years before taking over as coach, can see the difference in the Cougars.
“I see big improvement in that Greenfield program. I really do,” Graham said. “I think Michael’s doing a good job of getting them better. They are putting up a fight. We’re not walking over them, especially in doubles.”