Bishop Miege’s Will Grier and John Schultz win doubles at Kansas 4A state

The Bishop Miege doubles team of Will Grier and John Schultz had it all going on Saturday on the final day of the Kansas Class 4A state tournament at Kossover Tennis Center in Topeka.

Grier and Schultz won the state title by beating McPherson’s Kento Aizawa and Nolan Schrader 6-2, 6-3 in the championship. Grier and Schulz had knocked off Wichita Collegiate’s Austin Gartner and Matt Regehr in a semifinals match that went to the tiebreaker wire. The Miege duo won 5-7, 6-0, 7-6 (7-5).

The doubles title pushed Miege to a fifth-place finish as team. Collegiate won the team title. DeSoto finished seventh. DeSoto’s Luke Zoller took seventh in singles.

Fifth place for VanderArk

With his doubles partner having graduated, Kansas City Christian’s Jackson VanderArk shifted to singles this year.

VanderArk, a junior, dropped his first-round match in a tiebreaker to Sterling’s Kyler Comley, then reeled off five straight victories and took home fifth place at the Class 3-2-1A state tournament at Wichita’s Riverside Tennis Center.

And, he did so convincingly, finishing with a 28-3 overall mark.

In the five losers-bracket matches, VanderArk won 45 games to his opponents’ nine, twice winning by 9-0 scores.

His teammate, Mitchell Paul, took 10th place, and Maranatha Academy’s Aaron Bowlin finished eighth.

VanderArk said the transition has been good, but it wasn’t that easy.

“Last year, I relied a lot on my doubles partner, Alex Kartsonis, and he’s really, really good,” VanderArk said. “ But yes, it has been a good transition.”

Kansas City Christian won state in his freshman year, and getting another title and winning the singles crown are among VanderArk’s senior-year goals, he said.

▪ In Class 5A at Wichita Maize South, St. James Academy and Mill Valley tied for 12th place with 10 points. St. James’ Adam Burke finished eighth in singles, and Mill Valley’s Alec Bergeron and Andrew Bock were seventh in doubles.

This story was originally published May 14, 2016 at 7:17 PM with the headline "Bishop Miege’s Will Grier and John Schultz win doubles at Kansas 4A state."