Platte County continues strong start, repeats as Branson Doubles Invitational team champion

The graduation of four senior starters leads to the necessity of retooling doubles teams.

Platte County looks pretty well set at this point in the season, evidenced while capturing the Branson Doubles Invitational title for a second straight year. The Pirates finished top two in all four individual flights Friday at Branson High School with seniors Daniel Bunge and Quentin Miller taking first place at No. 3.

Bunge entered the starting lineup for the first time this season at No. 5 singles, while Miller continues to play doubles only for Platte County, which went 4-0-1 in the doubles duals. The Pirates split 2-2 with Ozark, which lost to host Branson and finished 4-1-0. Platte County beat Branson 3-1.

Platte County went 17-3 overall in the 20 doubles matches played.

“I learned a lot about our team this week,” Platte County coach Zach Keith said. “These guys are not just good tennis players, but they are incredible competitors. You never really know how someone will respond in tough moments until you see them on court with the pressure on, but these guys showed (on multiple occasions throughout the week) that they can produce some of their best tennis when it matters the most.”

Platte County’s No. 1 team of senior Gavin Nichols and junior Hayden Cook went 3-1 to finish second in that flight, while junior Jack Bralley and senior Aaron Vaughan also came in as runnerup in the No. 2 flight, which featured a three-way tie at the top. Branson claimed first by the tiebreaker of fewest games lost, and Bralley and Vaughan beat Ozark’s No. 2 team head-to-head to determine the second tiebreaker.

Platte County junior Paul Havemeier, the Pirates’ No. 6 singles player, also made his varsity doubles debut, teaming with freshman Mitchel McBratney to go 4-1 at No. 4 doubles withe lone loss coming against Branson.

Against Ozark, Platte County’s teams of Bralley/Vaughan and Havemeier/McBratney both won by scores of 6-3 to earn the split, while the Nos. 1, 2 and three teams were victorious against Branson to earn the critical team victory. The Pirates earned clean sweeps against Logan-Rogersville, West Plains and New Covenant Academy to come away with the repeat team title in the unique tournament.

“My other big takeaway this week was that these guys have really bought into the ‘team’ aspect of tennis, which isn’t easy to do,” Keith said. “The last two seasons our trip to Branson has resulted in really high-quality tennis, but it’s also been contentious. I don’t mean that in a bad way. They’ve got kids who are really vocal and get really amped up when things get competitive, and our guys matched that intensity collectively throughout the dual and tournament.

“I know it was a lot of fun for our guys, and it was a lot of fun for me to be a part of as well.”

Platte County 7, Branson 2

The two teams met for a dual Thursday night at Branson High School, helping Platte County take full advantage of the road trip.

Platte County took a 2-1 lead out of doubles with wins at No. 3 for Bunge and Miller (8-4) and No. 1 for Nichols and Cook (8-6). The right results carried over to singles with Nichols (9-7 at No. 1) just avoiding a tiebreaker, while Cook (No. 3) and Bunge (No. 5) both winning in tiebreakers to help turn the tight dual.

Bralley was dominant at No. 2 (8-1), while Havemeier captured Platte County’s fifth singles victory at No. 6.

Platte County 8, Carthage 1

In addition, the Pirates played a neutral site dual with Carthage on Thursday at Branson High School.

Platte County swept the three doubles matches, while Nichols, Bralley, Vaughan, Bunge and Havemeier were singles winners. Cook dropped a tight 9-7 match at No. 3 for the Pirates’ lone loss.

With the win, Platte County improved to 5-0 on the season and continued to show potential to build on last year’s Class 2 playoff appearance, the first in program history. Nichols leads the way in his third full year at No. 1, while already owning the only three individual district titles in program history plus a pair of state medals.

Bralley made a jump from No. 4 to No. 2 in the singles pecking order, while Cook, Vaughan, Bunge, Havemeier and Miller are all first-year contributors.

“Looking at this group of people, I think we have a lot of potential, and we really could make a deep state run if we put in the work,” Nichols said. “From what I’ve seen so far, everyone is willing to get better, so I like our chances.”

Platte County 5, Liberty North 4

Nichols and Cook came away with a critical comeback victory in the No. 1 doubles match Tuesday at Platte County High School to help the Pirates hold on for a nonconference dual win.

The 9-7 outcome coupled with the 8-4 victory for Bunge and Miller at No. 3 sent Platte County into singles with a 2-1 advantage. A split of the six matches ended up being enough for the Pirates to hold on with Nichols (8-3 at No. 1), Vaughan (8-2 at No. 4) and Bunge (8-5 at No. 5) the singles winners.

Having ascended to the No. 1 singles spot late in his freshman season, Nichols often ends up mixing and matching in doubles teams but showed the early cohesion with Cook in this year’s pairings after overcoming a late deficit against Liberty North seniors Samuel Curnow and Donovan Knish.

“What I’ve really like about Hayden is he’s very responsive. He really listens,” Nichols said. “He listens to my feedback. He’s always trying to get better. He’s always positive. He’s never negative; he never gets down. He always has good body language, so I’ve just really loved playing with him.”

The win over Liberty North came a day after inclement weather forced a cancelation of a scheduled matchup with Liberty.

Platte County takes the undefeated record into Monday’s matchup with Park Hill 3-0 before hosting Staley on Wednesday and traveling to Kearney for a nonconference rivalry matchup Thursday. The Pirates have six duals scheduled for the next three weeks before a key Suburban Conference White Division opener on Monday, April 22 at home against Grain Valley.