North Stars notch another tennis milestone

Another day, another first for the St. Charles North boys tennis team.

A day after the North Stars qualified their entire lineup for state for the first time, St. Charles North won its third straight sectional championship - their first time with such a streak.

Led by championships from Felix Nitzsche in singles and John Mittvich and David Johnson at doubles, the North Stars cruised to the St. Charles East sectional title with 32 points. Wheaton Academy finished second with 23 followed by Lake Park (14) and St. Charles East (12).

The North Stars clinched the sectional title when Nitzsche won his singles semifinal and Mittvich and Johnson did the same in doubles.

"That is great, we have never had the whole team qualify," Mittvich said. "It's more fun when you can bring all your teammates."

The North Stars have built quite the tennis power under coach Tim Matacio, now with five sectional championships in their nine years.

The 2009 boys team joins the 2006 girls team as the only St. Charles North squads to qualify six for state.

"It's kind of fun to be part of that," Johnson said. "We expected to be this good."

Nobody has been better than the Johnson/Mittvich duo, now 27-4 after Wheaton Academy's Charles West and Devin Moore pushed them to three sets in the final before the North Stars prevailed, 6-7 (8) 6-2, 6-3.

"We're just playing consistent, high percentage balls," Mittvich said. "Going for a winner when we have it."

"Our games complement each other really well," Johnson said. "I'm more of the consistent guy and he's more of the power guy. We're really coming along."

In the semifinals, St. Charles North's Dan Oakes and Nikhil Mehta took the Warriors to three sets before falling. Oakes and Mehta then lost again in the third-place match, falling to Wheaton Academy's Carson Boyd and Danny Torres 6-3, 6-2.

They'll bring a 20-6 record to the state tournament.

"They were kind of in the shadow all year," Matacio said. "They were right in that (semifinal) match. A couple things here and there we could have won that match."

In singles, Nitzsche breezed to the title with a 6-1, 6-1 win over Lake Park's Craig Cichowicz. In four sectional matches, Nitzsche didn't lose more than a game in any set.

Nitzsche's overall record stands at a rather modest 20-13, but that points to playing many talented opponents. Playing that level of competition is paying off for the exchange student now.

"We had a real tough nonconference schedule and I do that because I think it's good for the guys to play the best competition we can play," Matacio said.

In the third-place match, Wheaton Academy's Mark Phillips defeated St. Charles North's Christian Hoskey, 6-3, 6-0. Hoskey is 23-13.