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Miners edged by single point at Kingsford Invite tennis

KINGSFORD — Escanaba edged Negaunee to win the Kingsford Invitational boys tennis tournament on Saturday.

The Eskymos, who took three of the four doubles flights, posted 18 points while the Miners had 17. The host Flivvers were third with 15.

Negaunee’s championships came at No. 4 singles, where freshman Chas Kumpula defeated Kingsford’s Mikhal Roell in the finals, 6-2, 6-3; and at No. 3 doubles, when seniors Jacob Talaga and Darius Provost prevailed in the title match over the Flivvers’ Reece Fortner and Ethan Fox, 7-5, 7-5.

The Miners also had three runners-up with No. 2 singles player Luke Skewis, No. 2 doubles tandem of Drew Lindberg and Jakson Sager, and No. 4 doubles duo of Jake Larson and Evan Hassell.

Skewis and the Larson-Hassell duo each extended their championship matches to three sets before falling.

In addition to its doubles domination, Escanaba also won at No. 2 singles with Josh Grassel. The Eskymos captured No. 1 doubles with Paul Carne and Nick Dufour, No. 2 doubles with Addam Claes and Branden Kangas and No. 4 doubles with Max Shariff and Dylan Rosenfeldt.

The other two titles went to Kingsford’s Alek Shanks at No. 1 singles and Nick McCole at No. 3 singles.

“It was extremely close all day,” Kingsford coach Mark Shanks said. “There was a lot of three-set matches and tiebreakers.”

The six teams were divided into two pools — Escanaba, Kingsford and Iron Mountain in one and Negaunee, West Iron County and Menominee in the other.

After two dual matches in pool play, the players had crossover matches with the top individuals and doubles competing.

“Everybody gets three matches,” Shanks said. “This shows true team strength. On this day, Escanaba and Negaunee were a little stronger than us.”

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