High school tennis: Midview first doubles team scores upset at SWC meet

AVON — Midview's Kaiden Vonya and Marcus McMahon are one step away from a Southwestern Conference title in their first year playing tennis. The Middies first doubles team scored the only semifinal upset at the SWC tournament Monday, defeating Avon Lake seniors Brody and Carter Athey 6-4, 2-6, (10-8). The Shoremen duo were the defending first doubles champions. Vonya and McMahon will face Avon's Caleb Free and Grant Nagy in the final when the tournament resumes at Avon High today at 4 p.m. with the championship and third-place matches. "It feels awesome," McMahon said. "I'm just really honored to play for first place in the SWC. Me and Caden play pickleball a lot so we decided to give tennis a try. We like it a lot. I think we're doing pretty good for the most part, we just need to be more consistent." McMahon is a standout on the football team, and he also competed in track for two years and wrestling for two years. Vonya plays soccer and runs track. Turns out their chemistry on the pickleball court translates to tennis as the pair advanced to the semifinals with a 6-2, 6-2 win against Berea-Midpark's Daler Rustamov and Elias Koenig. The Athey twins were McMahon and Vonya's first varsity match with the Shoremen duo winning 6-3, 6-2 on March 30. But this time around Midview managed a pair of breaks to win the final three games of the opening set 6-4. Avon Lake shook that off for a 6-2 win in the second to force a 10-point match breaker, which is played in place of a third set for the first two rounds of the main draw. Neither team led by more than one point during the first 17 points of the match breaker, that is until Midview delivered a forehand winner on the only match point for either team, clinching a spot in the final. "It definitely feels surreal," Vonya said. "I didn't think we would make it this far, but we're playing for the conference championship tomorrow so that's pretty awesome. We just stuck to our game, didn't change anything up and stayed out of our heads. We kept our emotions to ourselves to not show them anything." As for the other finalists, Avon is in commanding position to win its seventh straight conference title with its entire team playing in a final. The Eagles, who received the No. 1 seed in every draw, lost just eight games in their 10 combined matches. Midview's second doubles team of Trenton Popeck and Lila Booth also reached the final, defeating Berea-Midpark 6-1, 6-2 and Olmsted Falls 6-1, 7-5. In singles, Amherst sent all three of its singles players — Katelyn Bussard, Marie Schneider and Josh Tomlin — to the final. Tomlin only dropped one game in his two wins while Bussard and Schneider each dropped two. "I'm really excited," Bussard said. "I think I played well today. Recently I've played some of the best I've played in a while. I just hope the final goes just as well. I'm just going to relax and prepare myself for however close it gets." Contact Chris Sweeney at (440) 329-7135 or ctsports@chroniclet.com. Follow him @CSweeney1686 on X.