SIOUX FALLS – While it was a tough Class AA State Tennis Tournament for Aberdeen Central, the Golden Eagles finished with a win in their final match of the season on Friday.

The top flight doubles tandem of Mitchell Hofer and AJ Prehn defeated a familiar foe from Mitchell to grab ninth place.

“That was the last match on for us. One of the last matches of the whole tournament,” said Central coach Trent Kurtz. “Kind of a nice way to end the year with a big win there. A lot of people watching.”

The two squads know each other well from multiple matches throughout the season.

“They’re a really good team,” Kurtz said of the Mitchell tandem. “We’ve played them four times and they’ve all been extremely close and luckily we’re 4-0 on it.”

However, wins were difficult to come by for the majority of the day. Central lost all three of the singles matches they were involved in, two coming at the hands of Rapid City Stevens.

“We had a couple of tough matchups,” Kurtz said. “Anytime you’re playing Stevens, that’s going to be a tough matchup.”

Kurtz said his team played better as the day wore on.

“We were average in singles. We got beat by some decent players,” Kurtz said. “Then we played pretty well in doubles. That’s kind of how our year’s been.”

Kurtz said the flight three doubles match involving Preston Kreber and Sam Casper in the fifth place semifinals featured plenty of momentum switches before the duo came up just short.

“We lose the first game at deuce and we win the next 14 points in a row,” Kurtz said. “It was unbelievable.”

However, the Stevens opponent then grabbed the edge and led 8-5, before Central tied it at 8-8 only to end up eventually falling 7-4 in a tiebreaker.

Kurtz said the second flight doubles team of Sekou Gogue and Jack Riggs ran into a hungry Brandon Valley squad in its match.

“We had a little revenge factor there going against us,” Kurtz said. “We played as well as we could when we played them in the first round at ESD.”

Sioux Falls Lincoln won the team title, claiming victories in eight of the nine flights.

Central finished 10th in team points.

While the Golden Eagles lost the majority of their close matches during the state tourney, Kurtz was pleased with the way his squad improved throughout the course of the season.

“We really played well,” Kurtz said. “We kept getting better and better and better, and really started peaking at the end of the year.”

Team Points: Sioux Falls Lincoln 588.5, O’Gorman 409.5, Harrisburg 321.5, Sioux Falls Washington 320.5, Yankton 231, Brandon Valley 206.5, Rapid City Stevens 189, Watertown 174, Mitchell 161.5, Aberdeen Central 103, Sioux Falls Jefferson 48.5, Sioux Falls Roosevelt 21, Brookings 18.5, Rapid City Central 3.

SINGLES

Second Flight

AJ PREHN: lost to Tristan Eizinger, Rapid City Stevens, 10-3.

Fourth Flight

JACK RIGGS: lost to Max Phares, Rapid City Stevens, 10-4.

Fifth Flight

PRESTON KREBER: lost to Tyson Dingsor, Watertown, 10-6.

DOUBLES

First Flight

MITCHELL HOFER-AJ PREHN: def. Brock Kruger-Evan Rodgers, Sioux Falls Roosevelt, 10-2; def. Luke Jerke-Jager Juracek, Mitchell, 10-6. NINTH PLACE.

Second Flight

SEKOU GOGUE-JACK RIGGS: def. Braylon Peters-Carson Kreie, Brookings, 10-2; lost to Gibsen Eszlinger-Ben Gromer, Brandon Valley, 10-5.

Third Flight

PRESTON KREBER-SAM CASPER: lost to Isaac Wright-Landin Roozenboom, Rapid City, 10-9 (7-4).