Jimmy Lafakis/MDN Minot High School sophomore Hunter Rice hits a forehand shot during Thursday afternoon's match against Bismarck Century at Hammond Park. The Magicians earned a 9-0 win over the Patriots.

The Minot High School tennis team showed resilience in a convincing 9-0 win over Bismarck Century on Thursday afternoon at Hammond Park. With the victory, Minot moved to 3-1, while Century dropped to 1-1.

Minot junior Zach Diehl set the tone with a 6-3, 6-2 victory over Jared Pitcher at No. 1 singles.

“Zach has been battling a sore hand, but it’s getting better,” MHS head coach Scott DeLorme said. “He has been pretty solid for us the last few matches. He has a chance to be right at the top of the region, and he has shown some good signs lately of getting into a nice rhythm as his hand slowly heals.”

Seniors Zach Renaud and Ridge Jaeger also claimed singles victories for Minot. Renaud bounced back in a 4-6, 6-3, 6-2 win.

Sophomore Hunter Rice, eighth-grader Aidan Diehl and junior Colby Opp were also victorious. Rice battled Century’s Caleb Wanner in a 6-0, 2-6, 6-3 match.

The doubles teams of Zach Diehl/Jaeger, Renaud/Rice and Aidan Diehl/Grayson Schaeffer handled their business in the afternoon’s final matches. All three teams won in straight sets.

“Two days ago, we split the singles with Legacy and went 0-3 in doubles,” DeLorme said. “We put a big focus on it Wednesday in practice. Today, it looked like the boys bought in. We saw a lot more aggressive play, and the communication was night-and-day different. We have a team that wants to get better, and you can see that in how they responded from Tuesday to Thursday. It’s still early in the year, but we saw progress and will continue to build on that in the coming days.”

Minot will host Bismarck High at 4:15 p.m. next Tuesday.

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