SAPPINGTON, Mo. -- For the second straight year, Poplar Bluff's season ended at the hands of the Lindbergh Flyers.
The Mules were swept 5-0 Wednesday in the MSHSAA Class 2 sectional playoff at Lindbergh.
"They were really good," Mules coach Charles Harper said.
The Flyers, who placed third at state last year after beating Poplar Bluff in the quarterfinals, improved to 14-0.
The Mules ended the season 9-2 after winning their second straight district title.
Lindbergh swept doubles play as top-seeded Calvin Faris and Brett Kim beat Humza Siddiqui and Trenton Nepean 8-3. Ben Murray and Layton Willie won 8-1 over Poplar Bluff's Nathan Smith and Ben Stewart while Adeesh Mishra and Brett Keele fell 8-2 to Jack Faris and Lukas Bell.
Kim, Lindbergh's lone senior, beat Nepean 6-0, 6-0 before Murray ended the match with a 6-0, 6-1 win over Stewart.
The Mules were also lost the opening set in two other matches while Siddiqui was serving down 5-4 in the first set of the top-seeded match against sophomore Calvin Faris.
"Humza was playing really well against Faris," Harper said. "We tried to string it out for him to see if he could finish."
Siddiqui finished 56-18 in his singles career, reaching the individual sectional playoff twice. Malay Bhatt, Poplar Bluff's last district champion in singles play, had a 55-23 singles record.
The 56 wins ranks 26th all-time in MSHSAA history.
It was also the final match for Nepean and Smith.
Nepean was 23-11 in singles play the last two years while Smith moved into the varsity lineup this season and went 9-1 in singles play and 18-5 with doubles partner Stewart.
Stewart won his first 24 matches in singles play before falling Wednesday. As a freshmen he was unbeaten at Nos. 5 and 6 for the Mules while this year he moved up to No. 3 singles and won all nine matches.
Stewart, Mishra and Keele can return next year along with a large group of junior varsity players.
"Already thinking about next year," Harper said. "Should be pretty good again. Some good JV guys already working hard."
The Mules won 70 of 88 matches with their lone team loss a 5-4 setback at Notre Dame when they lost a pair of 8-6 matches. Poplar Bluff won the rematch at home nine days later 7-2.
Poplar Bluff also won its own invitational tournament, the Cape Central Doubles tournament and the rain-shortened Farmington Invitational. Four matches were cancelled due to weather and the Mules entered the postseason having not played in 11 days.
Poplar Bluff rolled to its second straight district title by sweeping Cape Central and beating Farmington 5-1.
"Great season," Harper said. "Great bunch of guys. Already missing the seniors."