The future of boys tennis in the Minot area is looking bright as both the Minot High and Minot North programs are in the midst of a youth movement, with their rosters loaded with young talent that is already showcasing what’s to come over the next few years.

That youth was on full display at the state tournament in both the dual and individual matches over the weekend in Grand Forks. Minot High freshman Nolan Moore teamed up with Oliver Thompson – the lone senior on the Magi roster – and the duo came away with a fourth-place finish in doubles.

Minot North eighth-grader Brayden Callahan and freshman Colton Griffith became the first two Sentinels in program history to qualify for the state individual tournament and Callahan solidified his place in the record books as the first to win a match at the level, winning two and having an opportunity to play on the final day of competition.

“We’re starting to get ourselves where we want to be and getting closer to the positions we want to be in,” Minot North coach Colby Opp said. “Youth is not always a bad thing. I’m happy about our youth and I think that our youth has really stepped up this season especially, and I expect them to do so.”

While experience may have won out in the end, with the top four finishers in the singles competition – West Fargo Sheyenne’s Leighton Heick, Mandan’s Jared Christen, Sheyenne’s Brandt Aslakson and Grand Forks Red River’s Jullian Mallory – and the top-two doubles pairs all being comprised of upperclassmen, the more youthful players showed they have many more state tournament appearances remaining in their high school careers.

Moore and Thompson entered the state tournament with momentum after outplaying their initial seeding at the West Region tournament. Seeded fourth, the duo advanced to the championship match to grab the No. 2 seed out of the West heading into the state tournament. They picked up where they left off, winning their first two matches against Breckon Metcalf and Chase Johnson of Fargo Davies and Carson Peterson and Jordan Clemenson of Sheyenne to advance to the semifinals. Both matches required a third set.

“A lot of it has to do with their grit,” Minot High coach Scott DeLorm said. “We always tell them it’s basically to two sets. They bought into that. Even if you lose the first set or the second set, you just have to find a way to regroup. You know you’re playing at the state tournament and you know you’re playing the best players in the state. There are no slouches and to their credit, every time they dropped a set, they came to the changeover, they talked about what changes they were going to make and executed it beautifully yesterday.”

Moore and Thompson would drop their semifinal final match to the eventual champion duo of Grand Forks Central’s Jason Ling and Rylan Spicer and the subsequent third-place match, but DeLorme thought his top doubles team played some of their best tennis.

“I thought they played as well as they’ve played all year,” DeLorme said. “They beat a good Fargo Davies team in the first round and then they beat a team from Sheyenne in the quarterfinals, but they just played so well together. They finally found the right mix between pounding the ball and closing the net and being aggressive at the net. They showed what they are capable of doing at a high level.”

Thompson will be the lone departure from the team next year as the only senior on the roster. But Moore still has three more years left in a Magi uniform, and DeLorme knows that the sky is the limit for his top player, and he’s not the only one who believes that.

“Nolan has been so incredibly close all season long, but the last couple of weeks he’s had a couple good wins,” DeLorme said. “We’ve been telling Nolan all year that he’s a lot closer to being a top-four, top-five player in the state than he has any idea. Tom Wynne, the lead guy behind the Grand Forks tennis success for so many years had nothing but praise for Nolan as far as his game and what he has to offer for what the future holds for him.”

In the singles competition, Callahan came away as the top performer from the Minot area. The eighth-grader advanced to the second day of competition after dropping a hard-fought opening round match to Fargo South’s Joshua Wilkinson, 7-6 (8-6), 6-2. He rebounded by knocking off Sheyenne’s Nicholas Angus – a senior – with a 7-6 (7-2), 6-2 victory and rallied for an 0-6, 6-1, 7-6 (10-2) win against Red River’s Max Mecham, another upperclassman.

“I thought he played fantastic,” Opp said. “His level of tennis rose all weekend. His first match was tough. He played a good player who eventually got sixth and got overpowered a bit, but he rebounded and won a couple matches on Friday to get himself to play Saturday. He really raises his level based on the level of competition that he plays. He just competes no matter who he’s playing or what the situation is. He’s not afraid of those moments. It’s got to give him a lot of confidence knowing he can go on that kind of stage and play against those caliber of players and find that level of success.”

Griffith and Minot High’s Connor Ressler did not have the most favorable draws and were unable to secure a win in two attempts despite giving quality performances. Ressler drew the eventual third-place finisher in Aslakson and Griffith drew Heick, the state champion in his opening round match and then had to face Bismarck High’s No. 1 singles player due to a first-round upset.

“I thought Colton played and competed really well this weekend, too,” Opp said. “The draw was not as kind to him this weekend, obviously drawing the eventual champion in the first round and then to get the two seed out of the West in the consolation, that’s a brutal draw. But he played well and I thought in both matches he competed really hard, which is what we’re looking for and looking to build from.”

With so much youth and inexperience on the roster, neither Minot High nor Minot North knew what to expect when the season first began in August. In the end, the Magicians accomplished their goal of making it back to state as a team following a 18-8 campaign that saw them finish third in both the WDA regular season and postseason tournament. They would go on to place sixth at the state dual tournament. The cohesiveness is what stood out to DeLorme the most.

“We mixed in seventh graders to a senior and everywhere we went they did things as a team,” DeLorme said. “Nobody was left out. They included everybody and they bought into the team aspect. Oliver Thompson – our lone senior – was fantastic. He was kind of the guy behind all of that, making sure that everybody was included and everybody understood what it took to win and have a successful season.”

The Sentinels will only lose a couple key pieces to their roster with the departures of Parker Vigestad and Peyton Opp, but will return a bulk of their major contributors from this season, including Callahan and Griffith, who are only going to keep improving in Colby Opp’s mind.

“From Match 1 to now, there’s been tremendous amounts of growth for both of them,” Opp said. “They were both good young talented players, but maybe they weren’t used to playing at that upper-high-school caliber level and so as they played more matches at that level throughout the year, they’ve become more accustomed to what it’s going to take to be successful at that level, not just from a power and pace standpoint, but also from a strategic standpoint and figuring how to construct points and ultimately finish points.”

Minot North won its first West Region tournament match in program history this season, defeating Bismarck Century, 3-2, in the quarterfinal. While they didn’t advance to the state dual tournament, seeing the team being represented at the individual tournament only serves as fuel for the rest of the Sentinels’ young roster.”

“It motivates them to know that just because they are an eighth-grader or a freshman, they know they can do it too,” Opp said. “They play with these guys every day in practice and compete with these guys too and maybe they aren’t there yet, but they’re not that far off, but they have to know they can come in and have those same types of results if they put in the work.”