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Mason High School's junior varsity team had 14 players on its 2008 roster.

And with only seven spots in the everyday lineup, fourth-year coach Andy Keimer had the difficult task of fitting all of his players in at some point.

Mission accomplished.

The Comets were 13-3 in the regular season heading into this past weekend's JV tournament in which they were in Flight A.

"It's a very balanced team, a bunch of hard-working guys that enjoy playing tennis," Keimer said. "They've gotten better over the year and you can see the improvement.

"The kids are pretty understanding," he added. "Most of them know their roles. For the most part, I try to rotate and give them all experience to build on so they have the foundation."

Mason's big wins came against Kings and Sycamore, both by 3-2 scores. It marked the first time in Comets' JV history they beat the Aves.

"We beat some good teams," Keimer said. "We have four or five guys that were on the JV team last year because there's so many seniors. We have several sophomores that are really good leaders, and we won those 3-2 matches that could have gone either way."

Sophomore Kevin Fitzgerald played first singles most of the year, while fellow sophomore Zaki Khalid was at second singles.

Freshman Bharat Bhirani was one of the Comets' most-improved players.

"We have a lot of depth," Keimer said. "We don't have one or two superstars leading the way. All 14 guys can step in and be pretty consistent. There's not a huge difference between the top guy and the bottom guy. If they keep working hard, they'll do a great job for the varsity teams."

Twelve seniors are in the program — five on varsity 'A' and seven on varsity 'B' — so there will be some holes to fill come 2009.

"With a lot of seniors, some of them will have the opportunity to compete on varsity A," Keimer said. "This is a great opportunity for them the next two or three years."

Other team members are: junior Michael Venere; sophomores Nithin Banda, Ryan O'Connor and Joseph Patrick; and freshmen Georgy Dmitriev, Shinya Michimi, Pushkaran Palani, Archit Sahai, Krishnaraj Seenivasan, Kushant Sunkara and Erik Waters.

"To just prepare them for school competition and give them experience," Keimer said of his goals. "Wins and losses are not the primary goal. It's developing them as tennis players in our program and giving them experience and confidence."

Contact this reporter at (513) 755-5113 or smatthews@coxohio.com.

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