Isaiah Lang just became the first ever single player for tennis to go to state for Gardner Edgerton high school. The school has not had any single players for tennis go to state, but a doubles team went to state in 1985 which was 40 years ago.
Lang is excited to get to compete in state and is proud of what he has accomplished.
“It feels great to be going to state for tennis,” Lang said. “It will be cool to play in such elite company. I will be playing singles. I feel super proud of myself and all the hard work I put in.”
Lang explained that he was glad he picked up the sport so quickly.
“Almost every single one of the players at state have been lifetime players, so I feel pretty good that I was able to pick it up so quickly and compete at such a high level,” Lang said.
Isaiah is the only one in school history to go to state as a single player. Forty years ago there was a team from our school who made it to state for doubles not singles only doubles.
“I will be going to State this Friday,” Lang said. “I have been playing tennis since spring my freshman year. I really decided to put in some hard work this past offseason, I had some really great coaches.”
Derrick Abromeit is the boys tennis coach. He a is good at according to Lang.
“I am very proud of Isaiah making it to state. He has worked very hard off season to put himself into this position,” Abromeit said.
He was shocked to see Isaiah make it to state because no one had made it to state in the past 40 years of school history for tennis on the boy’s team.
“It has not been since 1985,” Abromeit said. “Tim Garner went to state in 2004 or 2005, but it is nevertheless impressive that he was able to qualify. Our part of the state is by far the most competitive area, and it is difficult to get through.”
Abromeit was excited to hear that Lang won his regional match to qualify for state this friday.
“I was pretty confident he had a chance when I found out which teams were in our regional,” Abromeit said. “His level of play had improved so much that I expected him to have a legitimate chance. He is a very intelligent young man, and he works hard to plan and play his matches. I was relieved when he got his nerves under control and won his qualifying match at regionals.”
