Saratoga News

Sports

Courtside boys 18s, girls 15s win NorCal, advance to state

By Kevin Sparrer

The Courtside Tennis Club in Los Gatos is breeding champions.

Courtside sent five teams to the Northern California championships on Aug. 4-6, and two of the teams came home champions. The boys 18s team defeated the Gold River Club from Sacramento in the final round of the tournament thanks to a few solid performances, while the girls 15s also finished on top in the tournament. Neither of the two teams had to play any doubles match--due to the outstanding play in the singles portion, they had already clinched the championships.

The boys 18s were led by 17-year-old Patrick Brogan, formerly of Los Gatos High School and on his way to attending Arizona State University. Brogan played in the No. 1 spot while D.J. James, 17 from Bellarmine, followed at No. 2. Ronald Huang, 18, originally from Lynbrook now moving to UC-Davis, was the third player in the rotation. Each of these three players won in straight sets to help win the championship.

Behind Huang was Jon Teel, 17 from Los Gatos High; Mark Waylonis, 18 from UC-Davis, Simon Wu, 16 from Thacher; Mike Wu, 15 out of Saratoga High School; and Tim Switzer, 17 from Los Gatos High. It was Waylonis who solidified the win for Courtside with a win in a tiebreaker match. Waylonis won in straight sets 6-3, 7-6 (3).

For the girls 15s it was Kiersten Meehan, 14 of Mitty High School, in the No. 1 spot; Jamie Solomon, 15 of St. Steven's Academy in Austin, Texas, at two; Anastasia Glyantseva, 14 from Cupertino High School, in at three; Tara Nguyen, 14 from Monta Vista High School, at No. 4; Nikky Behmaram, 14 from Saratoga High, at No. 5; and Carolina O'Haren, 14 from St. Francis, at No. 6. Also participating in the tournament were Val Motro, 14 from St. Francis, Melanie Woods, 15 from Mitty High School, and Kelly Nose, 14 and also from Mitty.

The boys 15s found their way into the final round, but were defeated there by a strong Sonoma/Marin All-Stars team. For Courtside, Cody Thayer in the No. 6 spot, was the only player to win his match in the final round. The rest of the team consisted of Andrew Hseih, Garrett Taylor, Jimmy Manning, Brian Tsai, Steven Chung, Kevin Brogan, Eugene Trilesnik and Jeremy Dezirek.

The girls 12s lost in the first round of the tournament to the team that eventually went on to become the champion, but Courtside made up for it with a win in the consolation bracket. The team was led by Isabelle Castellanos. The rest of the team includes Tiffany Nguyen, Courtney Hall, Katey Collins, Taylor Ditzler, Schwatha Bharajawha, Celeste DeLula, Megna Goldberg, Keiki Sunderland and Meleanna Sunderland.

The boys 12s were also eliminated early in the tournament, taking a tough loss in the second round despite strong wins from Jason Wu at No. 1 and Vikram Chari in the No. 5 spot. The rest of the team includes captain Tim Nguyen, Eric McCafferty, Kevin Gao, Kial Kaiser, Kyle Pease, Conner Dodds and Viet Bui.

The boys 18s and girls 15s teams were to continue on to the state championships. They were to play for the GarGlenney Cup Aug. 19-20 in Southern California.