Baseball is the most important thing to the Drumright family. Carter Drumright is a star junior pitcher and shortstop for the Collegiate baseball team. Maddox Drumright, his younger brother, is a star rookie catcher. During the 1990s, both their dad, Greg, and uncle, Mike, pitched for Wichita State baseball.
But the Drumright boys have also liked playing tennis together for the school team when they are not practicing or playing baseball for Collegiate in the spring. The Drumright brothers won the doubles title at the Class 3-1A boys tennis state event on Saturday at the Harmon Park Tennis Complex in Prairie Village. This shows how well they work together and how good they are naturally.
“Trying to keep up with school and play baseball and tennis at the same time is pretty mentally draining, but we love it,” Carter Drumright said. A lot of fun to play tennis with my brother. This was without a doubt one of the best times I’ve had playing sports. There’s nothing better than beating your brother at state.
Since the boys’ main sport is baseball, they spent most of their spring practice time helping the Collegiate baseball team to a 14-5 record. Simon Norman, the tennis coach, was happy to work with Joe Gehrer, the baseball coach, to make sure that the brothers had time to train together. They still played in 25 tennis matches together this season.
The Drumright brothers lost twice in the second event of the season, but then they won 22 straight games to end the season. This included a great run at the state tournament where they lost only four games in four matches.
Norman said, “It’s really hard to believe how good they are as athletes.” “They play baseball most of the time, so they don’t play tennis very often.” But they love each other and get along great. They played about 30 games together, and I never heard them get mad or cross with each other. They looked out for each other and said nice things about each other. Everyone was killed.
Collegiate beat Conway Springs 9–2 at home on Thursday in the first round of regional play. The Drumright brothers played in the game. They drove to the Kansas City area after the game to get ready for state tennis on Friday and Saturday.
The student, Maddox, wasn’t sure if he wanted to play tennis in high school, but he changed his mind when Norman said that the brothers could only play with each other.
Maddox Drumright said, “It’s great to play with Carter because we always know where the other one is and what balls we can get to.” “At state, we were both pretty angry.” We never felt bad about ourselves because we knew things were going well. It was so much fun to win.
Collegiate (44 points) easily beat Central Plains (32) and Smoky Valley (22) to win its 27th team state title in program history and sixth in the last eight state tournaments. All four of its teams won medals.
In singles, sophomore Charlie Gentile came in third, and senior Omar Al-Tabbal came in fifth. Sky Fujinuma and Rahul Madhavan, seniors, played doubles and came in ninth for Collegiate.
In singles, Smoky Valley senior Keaton Leiker came in sixth, Hesston senior Will Whiter came in eighth, Sterling freshman Jace Darnauer came in ninth, and Classical junior Noah Doom came in tenth. Other doubles medalists from the area were Asher Deutschendorf and Braiden Liechty, a junior from Hesston, who came in third; Gabriel and Ezekiel Baker, juniors from Smoky Valley, who came in sixth; Isaac Winter and Layne Whitney, juniors from Conway Springs, who came in tenth; and Nelson and Nyquist, seniors from Smoky Valley, who came in eleventh.
The Arkansas City doubles team of Oakley and Dawson O’Donnell made it count in their last year of high school. With their father, Aaron, as their coach, the brothers won the Class 5A doubles state title on Saturday at the Andover District Tennis Complex. It was a real family event.
Since they had lost in the state playoffs the year before, the win was even more powerful. The father-coach, Aaron O’Donnell, said, “I was pretty much a wreck all week.” “When you think about all the trips, lessons, tournaments, good days, and bad days over the years, seeing it all come together was just… satisfying.”
“That was so heartbreaking and disappointing last year, but this was the exact opposite.” It was an even bigger deal that the O’Donnell brothers ended the season with a perfect 39-0 record.
“My brother and I have wanted to do this for three years,” Dawson O’Donnell, a junior and younger brother, said. “It’s just amazing that I was able to win a championship with my brother on the team and my dad coaching us.”
They have chemistry because they’ve played together for years, but their games also work well with each other. Dawson is the bigger, more aggressive hitter, while Oakley, who is a senior, is great at setting up points and making opponents hit Dawson’s dangerous forehand.
They made it look easy by making it to the state finals, but they knew anything could happen after losing to a team they had beaten three times earlier in the season in the previous year’s playoffs.
The same thing happened again on Saturday. The O’Donnell brothers had already beaten Isaac Huber and Trevor Sagehorn, two seniors from Andover Central, four times, including twice in the playoffs at the AV-CTL Div. II league level and once at the 5A regional level. There would be no upset this time; the O’Donnell pair easily won the finals 6-2, 6-2.
Aaron O’Donnell said, “They had been so close last year that they saw this year as unfinished business.” “I believe this is my seventh individual or pair state title. It’s been fun to win them with other people’s children.” Not like other times, though, when you do it with your own kids. They are also the only ones who have never lost.
With 29 team points, St. James Academy won its first team title in the school’s history, beating both Andover Central and Blue Valley Southwest by one point.
The singles title went to BV Southwest junior Sanjay Rajkumar, who beat Maize South sophomore Evan Goates 6-3, 6-3. Goates had a great 33-3 season and made it to his first state final.
Bishop Carroll freshman Rock Steven came in third, Eisenhower junior Kyle King came in fifth, Andover Central junior Jaxon Post came in sixth, Andover senior Paul Jittawait came in tenth, and Kapaun Mt. Carmel senior Jack Judkins came in eleventh.
Other local medalists in the doubles event were Isaac Homan and Lad Oborny (Andover), Trey Lacy and John Korfhage (Kapaun Mt. Carmel), Jackson Rosa and Gabe Weber (Bishop Carroll), Nathaniel Haines and Greg Marsh (Newton), Brady Crawford and Preston Heard (Maize South), Henry Walker and Elias Kachelmeier (Andover Central), and Nicolas Azcorra Russo and Gabriel Shaffer (Valley Center).
Class 4 a Boys Tennis: Buhler Wins First Team State Title
Buller wins the state title for the first team in Class 4A boys’ tennis. Independence had been the best Class 4A boys’ tennis team for three years, but Buhler beat them in the finals by a score of 40 to 35 to win their first team title in school history.
After the first day of the state event at the Kossover Tennis Center in Topeka, junior Davian Spies and senior Amos Harder both made it to the semifinals in singles, and junior Von Woleslagle and sophomore Reuben Harder made it to the semifinals in doubles. This meant that Buhler pretty much had a lock on the team title.
It was the second singles title for Spies. Harder came in fourth, and the doubles team got third.
“Seeing Davian win the championship match after we already knew we were going to win the team title was the cherry on top,” said Buhler coach Matt Babcock. “This group was truly unique.” After coming so close last year, we knew we had a chance to do this. This year was different because we had a great doubles team to go with our singles.
As a freshman, Spies won the state singles title. The next year, he played through an injury to finish third at the state event. He beat Parsons junior Wyatt Shultz 7-6 (1), 3-6, 6-2 in the finals to get back to the top. He was fully healthy again.
“Babcock said that Davis won most of the important points to get the job done.” “That guy hits hard, and when things get tough, they might start pushing the ball.” Still, he acts like a very grown-up kid on the tennis court. He kept believing in his shots and hitting big hits against a very good defender. He can make all the shots, and he’s a very good player.
Woleslagel and Reuben Harder were a great first-year pair because they hit it off right away and were a title contender in every event. The pair had no trouble making it to the quarterfinals. In the third-place match, they beat the eventual winners from Independence by default due to injury.
In the pairs final, Jackson Davis and Adam Everett of Winfield almost beat Camdon Julian and Aiden Denney of Independence, but they lost an epic match in three sets, 6-7 (2), 7-6 (3), and 7-5.
Hunter Worley, a senior from Wellington, came in fifth place in the singles tournament, and Hunter Mendez, a senior from McPherson, came in seventh. Other doubles medalists from the area were Bryson Archer and Alex Berger, juniors from McPherson, who came in fourth; Theron Mays and Lane Eck, freshmen from El Dorado, who came in sixth; Jackson Palmer and Matthew Norton, juniors from Winfield, who came in seventh; and Pfeifer and Ruddle, seniors from Augusta, who came in eleventh.
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Class 6 a Boys Tennis: Maize, Derby Picks up State Medalists
The 6A state event was held at the Riverside Tennis Complex in Wichita. Blue Valley West won its fourth title in a row and its second for the year. The singles titles went to BV West junior Francisco Landeras, who went perfect all season. The doubles titles went to Shawnee Mission East seniors George Kahl and Gregor Wiedeman, who won in a third-set super tiebreaker.
Hayden Herrera, a junior at Maize and from the Wichita area, won four back-side matches, including one to make up for a loss earlier, to finish seventh in a very tough singles group. In other news, Coen Sowden (senior) and Evan Clark (junior), who play for Derby, won four matches at the state and came in 11th place.