On paper it was a matchup of two Top 25 teams. The Barton men’s tennis team travel to Liberal as the 25th ranked team in the country. Only problem was waiting for them was the fourth ranked Seward County Saints.
The Saints steamrolled the Cougars by a 9-0 margin in a dual that wasn’t close. Seward is a perfect 11-0 on the season.
“We knew that it was going to be more than difficult to pick up wins against Seward and it was,” Coach Lyle Stickney said. “I hate to make excuses for losing, but, here goes … my Kansas kids are not as good of players as our opponent’s international team. If I’m not mistaken we lost in about five different languages today”.
The only two singles match which saw Barton win more than one game was at No. 4 and No. 6 singles. Benjamin Zamora won five games in his 6-2, 6-3 loss to Zach Suico at No. 6 while Ray Strunk lost No. 4 by a 6-3, 6-0 score to Felipe Casares.
The Cougars lost 6-1, 6-0 at both No. 1 and 2 singles. Lucas Castelani lost at No. 1 to Carlos Anez and Luis Soares lost at No. 2 to Alex Mosehle.
Barton was blanked at No. 3 and 5. Sam Barker lost to Ondrej Nice at No. 3 and Triston Herbst lost at No. 5 to Ngoni Makambwa.
Barker and Castelani lost 8-2 at No. 1 doubles to Nice and Anez for the best doubles showing for the Cougars.
Soares and Strunk lost at No. 2 by an 8-1 score to Rengifo and Makambwa while Herbst and Zamora lost 8-0 to Casares and Mariga at No. 3.
Barton will be out of action until April 5 when Hesston College comes to Great Bend.
“The good news is that we are scheduled to play Hesston and Bethel College after the Easter break and the playing field will be level,” Coach Stickney said.