‘If only we had this year.’ They wrote a great beginning but never got to the end.
READ MORE
The Stories of the Spring
High school sports seasons across Kentucky were canceled this spring because of the coronavirus pandemic. This series by the Lexington Herald-Leader and Kentucky.com is telling some of the best stories of the spring that we were denied from each Lexington high school. Click below to read all the stories published to date.
Expand All
Editor’s note: High school sports seasons across Kentucky were canceled this spring because of the coronavirus pandemic. The Herald-Leader continues a series today telling some of the best stories of the spring that we were denied from each Lexington high school.
For a notable doubles team, Levi Messner and Ben Philpot began playing tennis relatively late. Messner was an eighth-grader, Philpot a high school freshman. This sporting adventure seemed like such a lark, Philpot originally used a racket the family had bought at a yard sale for $2. Messner borrowed the racket his father used as a college player for Slippery Rock University.
“It was kind of funny to me,” Dave Messner said of his son, the tennis beginner. “He was playing with a racket that was probably 10 years older than he was.”
Messner and Philpot began playing as a doubles team for Lexington Christian Academy as sophomores. A year later, they found themselves advancing to the Kentucky State Tournament.
Gulp.
LCA Coach Kyle Macy — a veteran of athletic competition on the high school, college and pro levels — sensed anxiety.
“Coach Macy was, like, ‘Don’t worry, calm down,’” Philpot remembered. “Because Levi and I were both nervous.”
To settle the players’ nerves and put the state tournament in perspective, Macy added, “This is not going to be your last match.”
During a telephone conversation last week, Messner said he had forgotten about Macy’s attempt at calming the players before their first-round match.
“Oh, wow,” he said. “That’s crazy. That’s weird to think about.”
As fate would have it, it was the next-to-last match Messner and Philpot would play for LCA. They lost in the second round of the 2019 state tournament.
LCA’s first match of the 2020 season was rained out. Then, of course, the coronavirus pandemic led to the cancellation of the rest of the schedule.
“This is the first spring I’ve had in my whole life that I can remember not playing any sport,” Philpot said. “And this is the one I was most looking forward to my whole life. This is always the one people talk about when they talk about their sports seasons. Their senior year they did this and they did that.”
Senior seasons punctuate careers, hopefully with an exclamation point. After playing in the state tournament as juniors, Messner and Philpot had reason to think of winning the championship the next year.
Because of the pandemic, it’s impossible to even put a final grade on their incomplete high school tennis careers.
“We never had that ending,” Philpot said. “It just felt kind of weird.”
To explain the rapid improvement of the Messner-Philpot team, Macy said the players were athletic and hard working. Plus, their games complemented each other’s: Messner had a big serve, while Philpot’s hustle made Macy think of Boris Becker.
Earl Philpot said his son skinned his hip and leg diving for a ball in the region tournament last year. The match was temporarily halted so a trainer could bandage the wounds.
Another reason cited for the duo’s success is their personalities. Each is an extrovert with a determination to have fun.
“Like we hit a really bad shot, and we look at the other person and say, ‘Awesome shot,’” Messner said. “Like sarcastically. Laugh it off and move on. We tried not to take it too seriously.”
The teasing helped the players relax, not dwell on mistakes and move on to the next point.
Philpot recalled the players forgetting to have fun early in the state tournament.
“We were really tense,” he said. “We weren’t communicating. We weren’t joking around. And we weren’t playing well. Once we loosened up and started kidding around a little more, just joking, smiling and laughing, we started playing so much better.”
Messner, who originally persuaded Philpot to try tennis, said they became buddies as freshmen. The friendship began in Miss McKnight’s Algebra II class.
“The reason I talked to him was because he had a game on his computer that I liked,” Messner said. The game was “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare.” “It was just funny because he was playing it in class. I thought, oh, this kid is cool. So, I hung out with him. We became a lot closer after tennis started.”
Messner and Philpot plan to attend the University of Kentucky in the fall. Philpot, who said he would like to be an inventor, thinks he will major in engineering. Messner expects to major in finance.
Both hope to continue playing tennis in intramurals and other settings.
When asked how he’s coping with the senior season that wasn’t, Philpot said, “I’m definitely still coping with it.”
Messner said he was working at Idle Hour Country Club cleaning golf clubs and carts. He also plays video games and guitar. He’s also worked at his parents’ office, where — perhaps ironically — he made protective masks.
“It kind of felt good that I could do something to help people,” he said.
Philpot said he recently sent Messner a photo of them playing a match in last year’s region tournament. Messner texted back a message saying, “If only we had this year.”
“I was, like, wow, that really hit me hard,” Philpot said. “If there was a quote of the year, that would be it: If only we had this year.”
This story was originally published May 27, 2020 at 7:39 AM.
