One day after Republic advanced to the team tennis sectionals, Michael Nacy and Brad Hendrix teamed to win a doubles district title. Nacy and Hendrix dominated the individual district tournament in Nixa Thursday, dropping just four games in six sets to capture the championship.
For most of the season, Nacy and Hendrix have played on separate doubles teams to give Republic a better opportunity to win multiple matches during their dual meets. But they’ve known they would be paired together again for the district tournament.
“I’ve been looking forward to it all season,” Nacy says of the reunion. “I felt like we might have had a couple (of bumps) because we hadn’t played a lot together, but they weren’t anything major. It went pretty well.”
The only significant bump in the road came in the middle match of the day, when Nacy and Hendrix lost three games during their first set. Besides that, they were never really challenged.
“We worked out everything. I’d say we got stronger as the day went on,” Hendrix says.
The two advance to individual sectionals next week. As the top seed from their district, they’ll play the #2 seed from the neighboring district. The winner of that match will advance to the state tournament.
“I was looking forward to getting back to sectionals again with Michael,” Hendrix says, “and looking forward to getting another shot at Glendale if we do play them.”
Glendale — a district champion last year — eliminated Nacy and Hendrix after they had finished second in their district in 2015.
Sectionals are tentatively set for next Monday at Nixa.
