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After cruising through their first match of the Central Coast Section doubles tournament without losing a game, the Los Gatos High School duo of Lee Gerston and Chase Huebner had to know that tougher matches were ahead.
After all, while winning the CCS championship as juniors in 2003, the pair had to go three sets in two of their four wins.
But, phew, the path to successfully defending their section doubles crown was anything—and everything—but easy during the two-day tournament May 2527 at the Imperial Courts in Aptos.
After winning their opener 6-0, 6-0 against a team from Monte Vista Christian of Watsonville, Gerston and Huebner lost the first set in each of the next three matches before rallying to convincing victories.
Fittingly, the championship match was the toughest. Leland's Simon Cheng and Steve Richard beat the defending champs 7-6 in the first set, taking the tiebreaker 10-8, before bowing 6-4, 6-2.
Jay Wong of Mitty had his hands full, too, en route to the singles championship. He needed three sets to get by Saratoga's A.J. Kerin in the semifinals before topping Monta Vista's Ken Kao 6-4, 7-6 in the final.
For Gerston and Huebner, reality set in during the quarterfinals against Joe and Jeremy Heckley of Del Mar. The Heckleys, who had won their first match 6-0, 6-2 against a South San Francisco team, kept it going in the first set against Gerston and Huebner. The Del Mar squad claimed the first set 7-5, before the Los Gatos pair roared back 6-1, 6-3.
In the semifinals, Gerston and Huebner followed the same pattern. They dropped the first set 6-2 to Nic Amaroli and Connor Feeny of St. Ignatius before winning the next two sets 6-2, 6-2.
The Leland team of Cheng and Richard had a much easier time reaching the finals. They won their first two matches 6-3, 6-1 before topping Fremont's Dan Duog and Senthil Chidambaram in the semifinals 6-2, 6-3.
Cupertino seniors Anukul Schenoy and Jayanth Parupalli beat a Sacred Heart Prep team 6-1, 6-2 in the first round, but lost their next match to Leland's Cheng and Richard.
In the singles competition, the second-seeded Wong won two matches in straight sets before running into the fourth-seeded Kerin of Saratoga. Wong didn't lose a game in the final set, after splitting the first two sets 6-3, 3-6.
Kerin had beaten Thien Le of Siver Creek 6-1, 6-0 and Aaron Klapper of Leland 6-4, 7-5 before bowing in the semifinal clash. Klapper didn't lose a game against Monterey's Chase Clifton in the first round.
Before losing a 7-3 tiebreaker to Wong in the title match, the third-seeded Kao of Monta Vista easily took two matches and then upset the top seed.
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