April 18, 2008

Luther tops Central in home-season finale

PELLA—Jared Feddersen (senior, Fort Dodge) closed out his Central College home career with a singles victory but Luther College came away with an 8-1 victory in an indoor match at H.S. Kuyper Fieldhouse Friday.

That leaves Central at 11-12 at the end of the regular season. The Dutch are a likely No. 3 seed at the Iowa Conference tourney that starts Thursday in Cedar Rapids. Central, 7-2 against league foes, will open against the No. 6 seed in the six-team team tournament, but that opponent has yet to be determined. A flighted individual tournament will follow next Friday and Saturday. The Dutch have finished third the past three years, last winning the title in 2000. They haven’t placed lower than third since 1993.

Coach Bryan Mours was disappointed in Friday’s loss.

“You can’t lose that many close matches and expect to come out on top,” he said.

But Feddersen, a four-year standout for the Dutch, was a winner at No. 1 singles, defeating Thomas Orser 6-4, 7-5 Friday, evening his record at 11-11 after tackling a daunting schedule. That gives him 55 victories in his career, pushing him to fifth on Central’s all-time list. He’s one win shy of Jason Metzger (1995-98) and Joe Madden (1991-94). Former Fort Dodge High School and Central teammate Nick Cochrane is the career leader with 81 singles victories.

“Jared had a phenomenal match,” Mours said. “He did everything he was supposed to do. He kept his composure and most of all, he just refused to lose. It was an excellent No. 1 singles match to watch.”

Three other seniors played their final home matches but suffered singles’ setbacks. Chris Bliss (Ottumwa) fell at No. 4 singles while Nick Rohner (Wichita, Kan., Kapaun Mount Carmel HS) lost at No. 5 and Justin Scherff (Denison, Denison-Schleswig HS) lost at No. 6. The Dutch will also graduate Michael Hammond (Boone).

Central has played three meets in five days so Mours will give his squad the weekend off before beginning final preparation for the league tournament.

“We’ll come back Monday and have two really nice, hard days of practice,” Mours said. “At this point of the season, we’re not going to change anything major or tinker with our strokes. We’ve been playing great doubles so we’ll probably spend a little more time on singles and just make a few tweaks.”