I don't know what I am happier about. No Wait!! I am happy that we beat the elements, as that has been a much tougher opponent for us over the past 1 3/4 seasons. To have the rain start the second that John and Mitchel won their doubles match I see now as a sort of omen. It just came to me an hour ago as I fully digested and mulled over our tough playoff draw. Our pre-season goal.
Coach Winkler brought the bad news to me at the start of our Delran match today that we had just received a 5 seed and will have to travel an hour and a half to Metuchen to play St Joesph's in the first round.
This is how I see the whole playoff thing shapping up. We will now be road warriors, and take the bus trip to a win up Middlesex County way and then have one heck of a bus ride home. In all sincerity I feel stronger about this than I did about the conference title. Truth be told they were a 7-3 team at the cut off and we were a 7-2 team at the playoff cutoff date.
They weren't even in the playoffs last year. We were, and strangely enough we were the #5 seed last year also and traveled to Middlesex County too, and took on Bishop Ahr. So we can now take that same ride as the same seed to roughly the same place and finish what we started last year. AND WE'LL play St Augustine if we win, exactly as we would have last year if we won at Ahr. I LOVE IT AND CAN'T WAIT FOR THE MATCH AGAINST ST JOE'S !!!
I mean I thought we should have been the 4 seed and had a home match but for all the inexperience we may have, which really isn't any. St Joe's has no playoff experience and there record sits at 8-5 as we speak and we are 11-3. Sounds like they padded their schedule well with some sub .500 cupcakes before the cutoff date to make themselves look good for the South A playoff committee. Haddon Township is infamous for doing this. That same haddon township team we beat less than a month ago has a 14-5 record right now and is the 4 seed in the group 2 bracket.
I will do a little research on their opponents and I hope to have the exact date and time for our playoff match to you tomorrow. For now here's the playoff bracket and yesterday's result against Triton.
I want to thank Mrs Lamberto for the pretzels and powerade, that was very kind of her. I also want to apologize to the JV who didn't get to play today as I was told by their coach and PVI alum Bill Bodenschatz '96, that they have been struck by an injury bug.
Very sad and it seems, "Everybody Hurts," at Delran and for that we extend wishes of a speedy recovery for Bill's team before their playoff match next Tuesday. It was cool that Bill was here today and I could announce him as a member of the last PVI tennis team to win a conference title. Bill told me he was quite proud of you guys and seeing us in the paper and ranked. I'm sure other PVI alums felt the same. That was nice to hear.
WE WILL ALL play tomorrow against Heights as they have a big squad. So be ready and hope we conquer the elements and the rain that has made all of us hurt to many times this season, as we all don't want to hurt and miss an invaluable match play experience in preparation for the upcoming playoffs.
