Drew Hassenbein's win clinches Nassau boys tennis large school team title for Roslyn
Drew Hassenbein of Roslyn returns a serve during his singles match at the Nassau large school boys team tennis final between Syosset and Roslyn at Eisenhower Park on Wednesday, May 25, 2022. Credit: Peter Frutkoff
Roslyn had won three matches and Syosset had taken two. Now there were two matches still going to decide the fate of the championship plaque — four players dueling under the sun Wednesday at Eisenhower Park in third sets on the adjacent first and second singles courts.
Seventh-grader Drew Hassenbein, Roslyn’s 5-foot phenom at first singles, was playing Ansh Chadha.
Ultimately, Chadha couldn’t reach Hassenbein’s passing shot. Roslyn had the win it needed to clinch the first Nassau large schools boys team tennis title after the split into large and small schools tournaments. Soon Ethan Solop prevailed for Roslyn in second singles, too.
The top-seeded Bulldogs owned a 5-2 victory over the second-seeded defending champ, clinching a Long Island championship berth at Bay Shore’s Casamento Park on June 6.
“It’s a little surreal right now,” Roslyn coach Kerriann Jannotte-Hinkley said after winning her first team title since taking over in 2007. “It’s a strong team. It’s a young team. They work well together. They have a lot of heart, a lot of passion.”
Hassenbein is a national player in the 14-and-under ranks. The 13-year-old was No. 1 in the U.S. at 12-and-under.
“His IQ for tennis is something that I’ve not coached prior to this at this level,” Jannotte-Hinkley said.
He beat Chadha, 6-2, 6-7 (6-8), 6-2.
“I think my most important part of winning was I just played loose,” Hassenbein said.
Zach Sheena also won in singles and the Gavin Koo-Matt Stone and Cayden Shen-Bartek Dziedziach teams won in doubles for Roslyn. Evan Lee won in singles and the Ryan Jiang-Aayan Mehta team won in doubles for Syosset.
“Our future looks great,” Syosset coach Shai Fisher said. “We had an extremely young team.”
