Bedford boys win second straight tennis championship

CONCORD – The Bedford High School boys tennis team had a clear goal going into this season.

The Bulldogs topped off an undefeated season a year ago with a championship, and they wanted to do it again in 2011.

Mission accomplished.

Bedford won five of six singles matches Tuesday to take care of business early, beating Hanover 5-4 in the Division II championship match at Memorial Field in Concord.

“We worked all year for this,” Bedford senior Myles Utell said. “We set out with goals at the beginning of the season. Coming off an undefeated season, we said let’s double it. Let’s make sure that we keep that going and we did.”

Tuesday’s win was the 34th in a row for the Bulldogs (17-0), who last lost to Hanover in the semifinals in 2009. And after beating Hanover 6-3 during the regular season – one of Bedford’s closest matches – the Bulldogs knew they had to be at their best in order to win.

“(Bedford coach) Shawna (Morely) always says that Hanover is one of the best teams and I think that was enough said,” Bedford’s Mark HoSang said. “We all have improved. I knew that if we played our game, I liked our chances, even if they played their best.”

HoSang did his part in the No. 1 singles match, despite getting off to a slow start, defeating Hanover’s Nick Ballou 8-1.

“I wasn’t as focused on my second serve and I was rushing my first serve,” HoSang said. “I don’t think it was nerves, I think it was purely technique. I cleaned that up.”

Utell got the Bulldogs out to a 2-0 lead over Hanover (15-2), beating William Ives 8-1 in the No. 2 match. Bedford’s McKinely Grimes and Taylor Summerville defeated Hanover’s Andrew Pilsbury and Tornike Shubstiuze in the No. 4 and 5 matches, respectively, both by a count of 8-4.

That put Bedford up 4-0, needing just one win to clinch the match, but Hanover’s Evan Liu won the No. 6 match over Steven Troy 8-4 to keep the Marauders alive.

With one match left, both teams gathered around outside the fence where Bedford’s Jim Delahunty and Hanover’s Brandon Barth were still playing. Delahunty got out to an early lead, and despite a small rally by Barth, he held on for an 8-2 lead and the championship.

“We knew that we could take them, but we knew that it was going to be a fight,” Utell said. “We worked all week on wrapping up our singles, and working on specific things for each player. We made sure our doubles were solid because singles were not guaranteed. We knew that we would have to be perfect in singles to avoid doubles, and we had to be good in doubles to win it.”

The Bulldogs never had to worry about doubles, already wrapping up their second straight title.