Try as it may, the Wawasee boys tennis team couldn't hang with Warsaw. “The biggest thing we told the kids was, 'You came in with respect, you're going to leave with respect — how you handle yourselves, how you play.’” Wawasee coach Roger Brady said after his team's 5-0 Northern Lakes Conference loss at Warsaw (7-2, 5-0 NLC) Tuesday. Losing on all five courts, the Wawasee Warriors (1-12, 0-5 NLC) failed to win a set, and its closest match was a 6-2, 6-4 loss by Kyler Love at No. 1 singles against Warsaw’s Kyle Wettschurack. “Kyler played a great match, although he was a little sub-par than what he has been, but he did a good job,” Brady said. “No. 1 doubles (Isaac Rigdon and Dylan Houser) also played hard and tough, but Warsaw has talent and skill that we don't. That's just the bottom line.” While Wawasee will look for its first Northern Lakes Conference win Thursday at home against Elkhart Memorial, Warsaw's still perfect at 5-0 and will travel to NorthWood Thursday. With a win over NorthWood, Warsaw will be set for a showdown Monday at Concord between the conference's two lone unbeatens. “I'm stressing a lot of focus in practice, because we've lost focus this year during matches,” Warsaw coach Rick Orban said. “We've been winning conference matches 3-2 that we should have won 5-0. We've got NorthWood Thursday and we should win that, but (today's) practice will be all about focus, focus, focus. Friday's practice will be to directly get ready for Concord.” And with the win over Wawasee out of the way, the Warsaw Tigers passed that focus test. “These are the matches that don't scare you, but make you a little bit nervous,” Orban said. “You should win it, you know you should win it, but if you don't stay focused, it can come back to bite you. It's happened in the past. Any team can beat any team on any given day.”
