Tennis hopeful for MIAC play
A young Johnnie team aims for improvements on last year’s season to make the playoffs in a competitive MIAC conference.
The St. John’s tennis team is starting their spring season Feb 12 in Virginia, MN, to take on their newest MIAC opponent: St. Scholastica.
In doubles play juniors Wil McDowell and Hunter Fischer went 1-1, sophomore Mason Meyer and junior Will Fischer went 3-1, and sophomores Will Deters and Mark Rosen went 2-1.
In singles play sophomore Mason Meyer and first-year Ryan Will led the team with 2-1 records.
The Johnnies are looking to improve on last year, where they barely missed the playoffs, placing sixth in the conference.
“We have a super young team with no seniors this year,” head coach Jack Bowe said. “It’s a tough conference, and we are hoping to improve on last year and make the playoffs. I think we have a great young squad. As far as depth goes, I think that’s probably our strong suit.”
All-MIAC honoree McDowell returns for the Johnnies this year, looking to improve on his sophomore campaign.
He hopes the team can build on their fall play, “I thought the fall season went very well for the team.
We graduated our top two players last year so there were some big shoes to fill, but a lot of our guys made huge improvements to their games over the summer and were able to showcase that during the fall season,” McDowell said. “We were able to win a majority of our matches at a scrimmage versus Bethel, Macalester, and St. Olaf. We also had a few guys who were able to make some deep runs at the ITA Midwest tournament to cap off the fall season.”
After Saturday’s matchup against St. Scholastica, the Johnnies host Concordia and head to St Mary’s Feb 26 before heading to Florida in early Mar to play a plethora of non-conference opponents.
After they return from Florida in March, they will move onto conference competition.
