Sectional tennis: Wadsworth doubles team clinches district berth

MONTROSE — Wadsworth tennis players Brandon Ball and Vincent Gambaccini left nothing to chance Friday afternoon at Springside Racquet & Fitness Club.Serving exceptionally well and repeatedly blasting overheads, the fourth-seeded Grizzlies dominated Hudson's unseeded Chase Pinnow and Matt Galosi 6-2, 6-1 in quarterfinal doubles action at the Springside Division I Sectional.The win guarantees Ball and Gambaccini a berth in the Northeast District, with sectional semifinal, final and third-place sectional matches to begin today at 8:30 a.m. The Grizzlies will face North Royalton's top-seeded Enrique Isaev and Jerrel Rayen in the semis.Medina County's only other remaining entrant at Springside, Medina freshman singles player Malachi Pimpo, lost his quarterfinal match 6-1, 6-0 to Hudson's second-seeded Zelin Shen."It was a goal to get there (to districts) and it feels good, but we've got to stay focused and see how far we can go," said Gambaccini, a senior who played second singles in the regular season. "We know (North Royalton is) good. That's why they're the No. 1 seed. We just want to play our game and do our best. They're very good, but everybody's beatable."The Grizzlies weren't against Pinnow and Matt Galosi. The left-handed Ball held at love in his last three service games as Wadsworth finished the match by winning 14 straight points on his serve. The junior also blasted five overheads so hard the ball went over the approximate 12-foot-high fence on the baseline."When we had easy shots, Vinny and I were able to put them away pretty often," said Ball, who played first singles in the regular season. "I'm just trying to put it away as quickly as possible. If that means it's going over the fence, I'll take the point."As good as he was on overheads, Ball was equally proficient when it came to hitting winning volleys or baseline passing shots with heavy topspin. One of the few times he missed a volley, he somehow clipped such a small amount of the ball that it barely went over the net, with the accidental slice spinning it right back into the net before Hudson had any chance to hit it back."It's fun to play with him because it makes my job a lot easier," Gambaccini said. "His serve is so good that I've just got to put away the shots he sets up. (At net) he covers a lot of ground, so they have to really be careful when they try to go cross court or he'll put it away."The Grizzlies jumped all over the Explorers, taking leads of 2-0 and 5-2 before closing the first set. With Gambaccini joining his doubles partner in hitting unreturnable volleys and overheads, the second set was no different."It's nice having Brandon serve first because it gets us off to a one-game lead," Gambaccini said. "Then we just have to stay aggressive and keep them on their heels the whole match."Playing doubles together at the sectional tournament for the third straight year — they lost their first match in 2024 and went 1-1 a year ago — Ball and Gambaccini will face a much tougher opponent in the semifinals, but now that they've clinched a district berth they want more."We've been working toward that (district berth) and it feels good to accomplish it," Ball said. "It will be a tough (semifinal) match. We've just got to stick to how we play."Medina's Pimpo tried to do that, but Shen, who reached the state doubles tournament last year as a sophomore and won a match before falling in three sets in the quarterfinals, wouldn't allow it. Pimpo dropped a long service game at 2-1 and the left-handed Shen began blistering serves, forehands and backhands."He's got a crazy serve," said Pimpo, who called Shen the best player he's faced. "I don't think there was much else I could have done. I kind of got down on myself (after losing serve at 2-1) because I could not return the ball on his serve. I could not hit the ball back and he kind of ran with it. It was really fun, though. I'm happy I made it as far as I did." Contact Rick Noland at (330) 721-4046 or rnoland@medina-gazette.com.