Varsity Boys Tennis
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By Steven Giordano
The men’s varsity
tennis team completed their near two month long grueling season.
To end the first half of play, the Warriors had to reschedule
their match against Junipero Serra for two days later. Unfortunately,
for the Serra Padres that is, Valley came out firing. One great
moment for the Warriors was when number 2 seeded Robby Valderrama
defeated the San Mateo team’s Iyad Shihadeh in concise 6-0,
6-0 straight sets. VC won the match once Blake Markland and Clay
Cochran took down their opponents 6-3, 6-1. The following Tuesday,
April 5, against Archbishop Riordan brought out the best that
the Valley Christian Warriors had to offer. It was an amazing
display, the first two matches, won by Austin Andres and Valderrama,
saw Valley’s opponents fail to salvage even one game within
any set; each match was won 6-0, 6-0. The great swings kept coming
as Warriors bombarded the Crusaders to end with an amazing 7-0
clean sweep. Just once did the victors allow the yellow and purple
clad challengers to reach more than two victories in a single
set.
While the team was cruising along, they hit a wall, and they hit
it hard. Coming off of a perfect sweep, a pair of 5-2 losses were
received at the hands of St. Francis and St. Ignatius. Yet, the
St. Francis Lancers had to struggle to obtain that added number
in the victory column, especially on the doubles side. Cochran
and Markland defeated their duo of Lacers as they sailed through
the second set 6-1; this was after, however, an extremely stressful
opening set which witnessed a need for a twelfth game, (because
within a set, one must win by at least two games), which was eventually
won by the Warriors. The second doubles match required even a
third set, yet ended with Valley’s demise with a final of
3-6, 6-4, and 7-5.
The Warriors, in a rare Monday match-up pitted themselves against
the ever hated Bellarmine Bells. Valley could only amass one victory
as they fell to undefeated Bellarmine, 6-1. Entering their final
WCAL match up, the Warriors were in fifth place by themselves.
The team had to travel to San Mateo to meet the Padres of Junipero
Serra. Right off the bat, or rather the racket, the first two
singles, Valderrama and Andres, put down their opponents. To wrap
up the league season, both doubles teams of Cochran with Markland
and Kyle Bergland with Ryan Pickering won to give the Warriors
a 4-3 victory.
The Warriors finished the WCAL league season with a six win and
eight loss record. This week is the West Catholic playoffs, later
comes CCS. Representing Valley will be Andres, Valderrama, and
likely to be Chris Sanine on the singles side and Cochran with
Markland, Bergland with Pickering, and Bradford McLaughlin with
Conlyn Glover on the doubles side.
