LAKE STEVENS — The Arlington High School boys tennis team faced a close battle with Lake Stevens High School in an away match on Thursday, Oct. 11, which ended in a 4-3 loss for the Eagles.

The match represented the last of the regular season for the team, which as of press time was second in the Wesco 4A North division, closely trailing Mount Vernon in first place.

“It was a pretty intense match,” said head coach Sean Cunningham. “Lake Stevens won 4-3.”

Despite the loss for the team, several players had a successful game, including sophomore Connor Ghirardo.

“Our fourth singles guy, Connor, did really well,” said Cunningham. “He actually did well all season. He finished the year 12-4 and played most of the year in the third and fourth singles spot.”

Arlington’s No. 1 singles player, junior Trent Sarver, also had a successful season.

“Trent finished the year 11-5. As our No. 1 singles guy, he had some really key wins against our Northern opponents. In fact, he’s won the last four matches in a row,” said Cunningham.

Despite a loss in their final match, Arlington is now gearing up for the 4A North Division Tournament.

“We are lucky. We’ve gone through the entire season without rain, but it looks like next week that may change,” said Cunningham. “Outside of doing workouts, they’re just going to try to get in some match play. Regionals are like a new season and it’s been pretty good to us in the past.”

The top two doubles teams and the top two singles players will head to the division tournament, but it’s still undecided exactly who will be there.

“We kind of pool together players who have played well all season long, even if they didn’t necessarily win all their matches,” said Cunningham. “We are still trying to figure that out.”

Sarver is a sure thing, playing as one of the top No. 1 singles in the district, as well as the doubles team of Alex Robertson and Austin Brunkhorst, who defeated the Lake Stevens doubles team of Tyler Hilde and Alec Arevalo 6-2 and 6-2. They played their match against Lake Stevens as the No. 2 doubles team, but played in the No. 1 slot for most of the season.

“Overall this year I’m pretty pleased. We finished second in the North,” said Cunningham. “We beat Mount Vernon on the second go-around and we beat Snohomish the second time around. We definitely got better as the season went on. All the teams have challenges against the South, as the South is so strong, but we made big steps from last year.”

The 4A North Division Tournament is set for Oct. 16 and Oct. 17, at 1 p.m., at Mount Vernon High School. Depending on their success at that tournament, the Eagles would then head to the 4A District 1 Tournament on Oct. 23 and Oct. 24 at Jackson High School.