| The Prince of Tennis | |
| Season OVA, Episode 5 | |
 | |
| Air date |
July 28, 2006 |
| Episode Guide | |
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The Longest Summer is the 5th episode of the Nationals OVA and 5th episode of the Higa arc. It originally aired on July 28, 2006.
The opening song is "Flower-Saki Midareshi Hana" by GIGS and the ending is "Hello & Goodbye" by Kondou Kaoru.
Summary[]
Rikkai Dai's Yagyuu meets Kaido and asks him what he would do without his Snake. Kaido then asks Inui to let him play Doubles by himself and see how far he could go without his signature move.
Synopsis[]
It is now Doubles 1 with Kaido-Inui pair vs. Shiranui-Koichi.
The game starts and it takes 5 minutes to get just the first point, marking this as a match of endurance.
At the start, Kaido is wearing weights on his wrists and ankles and he is returning all of Inui's shots as well as his own shots even though it's a doubles match and he wasn't using his Boomerang Snake at all.
It then shows a flashback to Kaido, who overheard two people talking about the Kanto tournament. They were badmouthing both Seigaku and Rikkadai, Kaido, getting mad, started a fight with the two members from Murigaoka. Then Yagyuu from Rikkadai interferes to stop the fighting. The two members challenge Kaido and Yagyuu to a match. During the match, the two members purposely play badly while Kaido and Yagyuu expose their best moves. The Murigaoka members secretly film the match to gather data on the number one and two teams of the Kanto tournament (Rikkadai and Seigaku). However, Yagyuu who already knew of these group of reporters from Murigaoka who secretly film matches to gather data, swapped places with Kaido to deceive the Murigaoka members. Kaido pretended to be Yagyuu while Yagyuu pretended to be Kaido, as they switched uniforms and they performed each others moves. However, both complained of the others' performance of their special moves, Laser Beam and Boomerang Snake.
After the match, Yagyuu asks Kaido what he would do if he didn't have the Snake, what would Kaido have left if he did not have the Snake.
Back to the game against Higa Chuu, the score is 3-3 and the match has been going on for 2 hours with Kaido still not using his Boomerang Snake and Inui still letting Kaido get everything. It then shows another flashback of Kaido training while Inui was reading his data book besides Kaido. Kaido then tells Inui about the match with the Murigaoka members and what Yagyuu said, he then informs Inui that he intends to play the next match without using the Snake once as he wanted to see how far he can go without using the Snake. Inui not only agrees with this but he suggests something else. He wanted to see just how far Kaido can go and so he told Kaido that in their doubles match, he won't help Kaido rally at all, making the match a two against one situation.
The game is at 5-3 Seigaku lead, Koichi faints. The Shiranui and Koichi are tired out even though they are the two members on the team with the most endurance and also they are playing a doubles match against one person. Since Koichi cannot play anymore, it is Seigaku's win.
Characters Introduced[]
- Tomoya Shiranui
- Kōichi Aragaki
- Ushida Tetsuo
- Miyase Tomonori
Manga Chapter Equivalents[]
- Genius 240: A Strange Encounter
- Genius 268: The Place to be Found
- Genius 269: The man called 'The Hitman'
Anime and Manga Differences[]
- The match between Kaido-Inui vs. Shiranui-Koichi is not shown in the manga. The anime expanded the match with Kaido battling mostly by himself by the suggestion of Inui.
- Yagyuu questions Kaido what he would do without using the Snake shot. In the manga Kaido chooses to not use his Snake shot himself.
- Backstories for Shiranui and Koichi are given in the anime.
- Seigaku wins by forfeit in the anime due to Koichi fainting from sunstroke. In the manga Seigaku wins the match at 6-3. The anime still displays the 6-3 result on the scoreboard.