<p>Whiteland’s boys tennis team was able to beat every team it faced this season except for one. Unfortunately for the Warriors, that team was standing in the way every time a championship was on the line.</p><p>Host Center Grove withstood a couple of challenges to earn a deceptively difficult 5-0 victory in Friday afternoon’s sectional title match. The Trojans (16-4) will host their own regional next week. The Warriors finish the season at 16-2, with both losses coming against the Trojans.</p><p>“We don’t take anything for granted when we get an opportunity,” Center Grove coach Ivan Smith said. “They made us earn it.”</p>[sc:text-divider text-divider-title="Story continues below gallery" ]Click here to purchase photos from this gallery<p>Two quick victories by the Trojans left Whiteland with little margin for error. J.T. Embrey and Dhrumil Patel delivered a 6-0, 6-1 triumph over Wesley Hawk and Travis Robinson at No. 2 doubles, and Mason Runkle followed just seconds later with a 6-2, 6-1 win against Dylan Gross at third singles.</p><p>Those two points meant the Warriors needed to pull out each of the remaining three matches, and while the opening sets of all three were tight, Center Grove was able to seize the advantage in two of them and then clinch the championship when Mitch Runkle completed a 6-4, 6-1 victory over Corey Ullrich at No. 2 singles.</p><p>The lone remaining drama came in the No. 1 singles and doubles matches, where Whiteland’s representatives were trying to stay alive in individual tournament play.</p><p>Whiteland’s Quinten Gillespie won the first set of his match against Trey Thixton, 6-4, before Thixton responded by taking the next two sets, 6-3 and 6-2.</p><p>In first doubles, Center Grove’s Grant Herron and Nic Ballesteros took the first set against Garrison Pelfree and Lane Stephenson, 6-4, but the Warrior duo battled back to win a second-set tiebreaker. Herron and Ballesteros closed it out by winning the third, 6-2.</p>
