St. Charles East wins own invite

The St. Charles East Invitational traditionally boasts a strong field of teams from the Tri-Cities, DuPage County and beyond, and in that regard this year’s version, which took place on Saturday, was no different.

But one thing was different about the 2011 invite — the Saints won it.

“I’ve been with the program for nine years, and that hasn’t happened before while I’ve been here,” St. Charles East coach Rob Livermore said.

The hosts faced down strong challenges from Glenbard West, Wheaton Academy and Rockford Guilford which won all three of the doubles titles.

The Saints overcame Guilford’s three of a kind with strong showings in four of the five brackets including Justin Bowman’s championship win at No. 2 singles.

Bowman did not realize until he came off the court that the team title rested on the outcome of his match.

“No one told me anything, probably because it would have made me more nervous out there,” Bowman said.

Bowman, who beat Wheaton Academy’s Will West, 6-1, 6-4 in the final, got there by posting equally impressive wins over Timothy Christian’s Jon Elsey in the second round, 6-4, 6-2, and Logan Reiff of Libertyville, 6-3, 6-4, in the early morning opener.

“My first round was against one of the toughest players in the draw,” Bowman said. “Conditions were pretty windy and he played them well.”

The No. 1 singles title was won by Wheaton Academy senior Devin Moore, who overcame a tough opening set against St. Charles East freshman Jasper Koenen to win in straight sets, 6-4, 6-2.

“He took a pretty good jump on me in the first set,” Moore said. “He was very good at hitting angles, and I didn’t want him to be able to do that. I had to realize what he was doing and change it.”

Despite the final round loss, Koenen had a terrific day that included a hard-earned second round win over Glenbard West’s Matt Hirsch, 6-2, 4-6, 10-7. Koenen dominated the opening set, breaking Hirsch’s serve twice.

“I won the first set pretty easily, but I let off a little bit in the second set and I started making mistakes,” Koenen said.

Hirsch, the tournament’s top-seeded singles’ player won the second set, but cramped up in the tiebreaker.

“I was able to push through and win the tiebreaker,” Koenen said. “That was key for us to win this tournament.”

The injury to Hirsch in the second round was one of the few disappointments for the Hilltoppers, who performed well across the brackets, led by a second-place finish from Jack Kellenberger and Kerry Raiek at third doubles, and third-place showings by Hirsch at No. 1 and Philip Paeyna at second singles.

“We had pulled off three tiebreakers in doubles in the first round, and that got us off to a good start,” Glenbard West coach Jim Valleskey said.

Rockford Guilford’s dominance of the doubles side fueled its overall third-place finish. Their top doubles team of Matt Papke and Adam Stovall capped an impressive day by overpowering Geneva’s Colin Rapp and Ryan Doeckel for a 6-2, 6-1 win.

“(Rapp and Doeckel) did well in this tournament, which is very tough,” Geneva coach Peter Burkhardt said. “Doubles is about serving, returning and being aggressive, and they have those skills.”

Rapp and Doeckel earned their shot at the doubles title with a pair of tight wins, starting with a 6-3, 7-6 sweep of Libertyville’s Danny Pozen and Eric Klein.

“We fell off a little in the second set, but we were able to get it back,” Doeckel said.

Their second round match followed a similar script as the Vikings won the first set, 6-2, then got into trouble in the second.

“In the first set we played our game,” Rapp said. “They started digging some balls out and we missed some shots in the second set. But we got back to our bread and butter in the tiebreaker.”

After dropping the second set, 6-3, Rapp and Doeckel went on the offensive, attacking the net at every opportunity to come away with a 10-7 win.

The day’s best match turned out to be for third place at No. 1 doubles, where St. Charles East’s Connor Davis and Nick Maze gutted out a 7-6, 6-7, 14-12 marathon win over Max Mueller and Sam Young of Glenbard West.

“I’m exhausted,” Davis said. “We played a great match and so did they.”

It was the duo’s second long match of the day after battling back from a shaky first set to beat Wheaton Academy’s John Bodett and Phil Parker in the opening round, 3-6, 6-3, 10-7.

“That was a little early in the morning for us to play a match, but we pulled through,” Maze said.

That 3-set loss was just one of several matches that got away from the Warriors, who finished fourth overall, just a single point behind Rockford Guilford.

“In a tournament like this you have to win early, and unfortunately we didn’t start the way we needed to,” Wheaton Academy coach Matt Hackett said. “I love to see St. Charles East being this strong right now, they deserve this win today.”

The Saints’ invite championship was all the more sweet because they received contributions from up and down the lineup, including a major one from Sam Decker and Matt McCarthy, who won the third-place match at No. 3 doubles over Timothy Christian’s Bryant Beal and Christian Smith, 6-0, 6-3.

That win, like all the others for the Saints on Saturday, wasn’t just big, it was necessary, and they needed every one of them to turn a good day into a memorable one.

“It’s very special to be the winner of our own tournament,” Livermore said. “If we had not gotten a complete team effort we would not have won.”

The Saints finished with 31 team points, followed by Glenbard West with 29, Rockford Guilford 26 and Wheaton Academy had 25.