Blue Pony netters take on tough teams at annual Class A Duals

According to Havre High head tennis coach George Ferguson, things are going to start moving really fast for his Blue Ponies. And it starts this weekend in Cut Bank.

Havre is five weeks into the season, and now, the Blue Ponies hit their heart of their schedule, with competitive dual meets like the Class A Duals Friday and Saturday in Cut Bank.

"The Havre Invite always marks the end of the first part of our season," Ferguson said. "From a competition standpoint, things really go up a couple of notches the next few weeks. And that's good. We want to test ourselves, we want to play in tough matches, and most importantly, we want to have those tough matches keep making us better."

This weekend, weather permitting, should do just that. In Cut Bank, the Blue Ponies are scheduled to dual a pair of Class A stalwarts in Whitefish and Polson, as well as the defending state B-C champion Libby Loggers. A new addition to the meet, the Troy Trojans, will be another opponent Havre will face.

The Whitefish girls are the defending Class A state champions, while Ferguson said the Bulldog boys have one of their strongest teams in recent years. Polson is always stout, and both the boys and girls teams are deep and talented this season. Libby boys were state champions a year ago, and both the boys and girls teams have pretty much everybody back from those teams.

"It's going to be really good," Ferguson said. "Especially going up against Whitefish and Polson. Those two teams will really give us an idea of where we're at right now, and where we need to go from there. Libby is also going to be very strong. They have some outstanding players on both of their teams. So hopefully, mother nature lets us play because we will get some very good matches out of this weekend."

With Easter break in effect, Havre's lineups will be a little different, but many of the mainstays will be playing, including seniors Dustin Haas, Nate Korb, Jake Sedahl and Trey Hanson, as well as the junior tandem of Trey Murphy and Kennedy McKay. That duo has been performing well all season, as has the doubles team of Tommy Brown and Brady Ophus. On the girls side, Havre will have all three of its doubles teams in tact in Marcee Murphy and Devyn Solomon, Katie and Alex Donaldson and Megan Lindbloom and Baylee Miller. Junior Paige Nelson will also get some strong competition at No. 1 singles.

"We're going to be taking some younger kids and moving some kids up this weekend," Ferguson said. "And that will be really good for them. As for our older kids, they are playing well, and this should be a weekend where they really find out where they're at right now.

"Again though, we're still building, so the biggest thing is how we play, not what our scores are or how many duals we win," he continued. "I just want to see us play well. The weather conditions will be pretty tough it looks like, but our goal is to play as well as we can and come out of this weekend making sure we took steps forward. That's what matters most right now."

Havre will face Whitefish and Troy Friday and return to Cut Bank to take on Libby and Polson Saturday. The Pony girls will also be in action next Tuesday against Chinook.