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Here’s what makes Bexley’s Will Gingery the Dispatch boys tennis Coach of the Year

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Here’s what makes Bexley’s Will Gingery the Dispatch boys tennis Coach of the Year

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Emmett Pliskin might have done a double take at the Bexley boys tennis team’s schedule this spring had he seen anything less than an early season gauntlet.

A stretch of four matches in six days against Cincinnati-area powers Indian Hill, Seven Hills and Sycamore and perennial Division I juggernaut New Albany immediately stood out.

“Definitely a tough opening,” Pliskin said. “But looking back, we were ready and it prepared us down the line for the matches we played later on.”

Bexley won a combined four courts and lost each match, but the Lions ended the season with 14 wins, the OHSAA Division II state singles champion and an Ohio Tennis Coaches Association Division II district runner-up finish. According to eventual state qualifier Oscar Ramsden, that is where the ingenuity of coach Will Gingery’s approach truly lies.

“He sets us up with matches that are incredibly difficult,” said Ramsden, a senior who went 1-1 at state in doubles with junior Sam Lessard. “He puts an emphasis on getting better every match, win or lose. (Those early matches), we lost all of them. But we kept playing tough teams and we were winning. We all got better.”

For Bexley’s accomplishments this season, Gingery is The Dispatch’s All-Metro Boys Tennis Coach of the Year.

Freshman Henry Lessard brought the program its first singles state title since 1986, the Lions won the Central Buckeye League championship and six of seven players in the lineup qualified for district.

“(I am) tremendously proud,” Gingery said. “Going around town, everyone congratulates Henry and myself, and he’s probably the first one to say that him winning was a result of our team the whole year and a credit to the schedule we played.”

Henry Lessard was announced as The Dispatch’s Boys Tennis Athlete of the Year during the Central Ohio High School Sports Awards on June 20 at Mershon Auditorium.

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Gingery’s teams are 55-32 since he took over the program in 2021. Bexley tied for the MSL-Ohio championship in his first season, its first league title since Gingery’s junior year of 2012, and was third in the OTCA state tournament in 2022.

Two singles players and three doubles tandems have made state.

The difference in coaching those disciplines reflects Gingery’s team-oriented approach.

“You can play all your USTA tournaments (in the offseason), but three months of the year, when you put on a Bexley uniform, it’s a team sport,” Gingery said. “Singles is more black and white but in doubles, you can beat two players who might be better than you by knowing more doubles strategy, being a better athlete and working better with your partner. I really enjoy that aspect, that so much more goes into it than just tennis.”

A full-time real-estate agent, Gingery’s work schedule is a continuation of his five-sport athletic career at Bexley. He played football, soccer, basketball, baseball and tennis in high school, kicked for the Wittenberg football team from 2013-16 and has been Bexley’s junior varsity boys basketball coach for five years.

Gingery coached the middle school tennis team for three years before moving up to varsity and recently was named boys golf coach.

“I don’t have any favorite,” Gingery said. “By the end of the winter, I’m ready to get outside. By the end of tennis, we’ve just started youth camps for basketball.

“Once (a tennis) match starts, the kids are on their own, so you have to do your prep in practice and then you can be a fan in some ways, watching and giving some advice here and there.”

dpurpura@dispatch.com

@dp_dispatch

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