Liberty's Daniel Lynn and Freedom's Aidan Bodeo-Lomicky reached the quarterfinal round of District XI Class AAA Boys Tennis playoffs last Friday at Saucon Valley High School.

Lynn, the Hurricanes number one singles player, was eventually defeated by Stroudsburg's Brady Wyant, 6-2, 6-4.

"I beat him before, but I couldn't pull it out," said Lynn. "It was a fun match to play."

Liberty coach Leo Schnalzer and Lynn's teammates who attended the match were hopeful in the second set, when Lynn came back from a 2-5 deficit.

"He played well against a really good player and tough conditions," Schnalzer said.

Friday's weather was sunny but extremely windy and cold.

"It was one of his better played matches all year. He moved well, and as the match went on, he relaxed and made smarter points," said Schnalzer.

It was clear that hitting to Wyant's backhand was troublesome for the Stroudsburg senior, especially in the second set.

Lynn said, "I vaguely knew his backhand was weaker as the match went on and how strong his forehand was."

Earlier in the week, Lynn defeated East Stroudsburg North's Isaac Schefer 6-2, 6-3 in the second round of district playoffs.

"That was a good match. I think he is pretty underrated," said Lynn. "I came to the net a lot and had good overheads and volleys. I was more ready."

In the first round of playoffs, Lynn defeated Bangor's Paxton Ramsey 6-0, 6-0.

"There were a lot of deuce games, and I won all six, so it could have been closer," Lynn said.

Bodeo-Lomicky, Freedom's number two singles player, had the misfortune of having to face the number one seed on Friday, Parkland's Nick Kshatri, to whom he lost in quarterfinals 6-0, 6-0.

"I'd been sick the past few days, but I knew I could hang in there with the points. There were some games I was right in there, and I had some good shots, but I couldn't string anything together," Bodeo-Lomicky said.

In the second round of playoffs, Bodeo-Lomicky defeated East Stroudsburg South's Aki Mollenthiel 6-4, 7-6 (7-5).

"It was very windy, and he was better than I anticipated. He took me by surprise, but I think I handled it well," said Bodeo-Lomicky. "I stayed calm when it was close, and I was playing aggressively. He knew how to hit into the wind."

In the first round, Bodeo-Lomicky defeated Whitehall's Islam Ahmed 6-0, 6-1.

"He's more of an inexperienced player. My serve was on, and I was hitting all my shots," said Bodeo-Lomicky.

On the upside of Bodeo-Lomicky's first tournament appearance, the Freedom freshman would have faced Pleasant Valley's Jon White in the first round, one of the top seeds, had it not been for teammate, Andrew Sinai's withdrawal.

Sinai, Freedom's number one singles player and number one seed in districts, suffered a concussion at the East Penn Conference Tennis Championships the weekend before at Parkland High School, according to Patriot coach Jeff Young.

Bodeo-Lomicky said, "That was going to be a tough match, and then when Andrew dropped out, I got the number eight seed and a better draw. It was great getting exposure and experience handling high pressure situations."

Also competing in the district tournament were Liberty's Julian Mark and Freedom's Ross Sonnenblick, both number three singles players for their respective schools, and Liberty's number two singles player, Milind Jagota.

The District XI Class AAA Doubles Tennis Tournament begins this week and will end with the final on May 4 at Lehigh University.