HIGH SCHOOL-OHIO

Tennis championships long time coming for Sycamore, CCD

By Jarrod Ulrey
Enquirer Contributor
Cincinnati Country Day freshman Kevin Yu (left) and senior Patrick Wildman share a laugh.

REYNOLDSBURG -- The championships won by the Sycamore and Cincinnati Country Day boys tennis programs at the state team tournament Sunday felt like a long time coming for both.

The Aviators' previous best finish under coach Mike Teets was third, and they were forced to knock off two-time defending champion Upper Arlington to secure their first title in the Division I tournament held in Reynoldsburg.

In the Division II event at the same site, CCD improved on a pair of third-place finishes the last two years to also win its first championship.

Much of the drama surrounding Sycamore's first title came at first singles, where Deepak Indrikanti beat UA's Charles Shewalter 6-1, 6-4 to secure a 3-1 victory.

The Aviators won both doubles courts but lost in second singles and were about to begin a third set at third singles when Indrikanti won his match.

"The last several years we've just had a total buy-in," Sycamore coach Mike Teets said. "They've pushed each other and showed a refusal to give in."

Sycamore, which beat Massillon Jackson 3-1 to advance to the final, got a 6-2, 6-4 win by Mustafa Ahmad and Noah Stern at first doubles to take the early lead.

UA's Jeffrey Melvin beat Nakul Narendran 6-2, 6-2 at second singles, but the second-doubles team of Alex Wittenbaum and Aditya Venkitaraman beat Tyler Holsopple and Anthony Yang 6-1, 6-3 for a 2-1 lead.

In the first-singles match, Indrikanti and Shewalter were tied at 4 in the second set when Shewalter was called for a foot fault to enable Indrikanti to break serve.

He then served out the match to give the Aviators the title.

"I relied on the support from my teammates and fans," Indrikanti said. "I hit my forehand well and I was mentally tough. It's an amazing feeling because we've never won before."

At the OHSAA state tournament, Stern and Wittenbaum lost in the first round in doubles and Ahmad teamed with Narendran to win the doubles title.

"I love it," Stern said of the team title.

CCD senior Patrick Wildman, who will play for Claremont (Calif.) McKenna College, joked with his teammates that they'd finally broken through after "years of choking."

The Indians beat Gates Mills Hawken 3-0 in a semifinal and took the early lead against Columbus Academy in the final when Wildman won his match 6-0, 6-1 over Evan Alexander at second singles.

Academy's Dean Firouzian and Austin Lawrence beat Chase Tholke and Will Cohen 6-1, 6-1 at second doubles, but Asher Hirsch defeated Jacob Wareti 6-1, 6-2 at first singles and Kevin Yu beat Mikhil Patel 6-1, 6-1 at third singles to give their team the title.

The first doubles team of J.J. Wolf and Shaheel Mitra was winning their match over Ryan Jung and Shrikar Kundur 6-3, 5-3 when CCD was awarded the win.

"We wanted this ever since we got into high school," Hirsch said. "It's awesome. Everybody was really hyped up and it was a great environment."

"We had probably the highest ranked team on paper, but that can bring extra pressure and they handled it well," coach Matt Dektas said.

At the OHSAA tournament Saturday, Hirsch beat Wolf for the state singles title and Wildman and Yu won the state doubles title.

Wolf was forced to default the title match against Hirsch because of cramping and still felt stiff heading into the team tournament but was winning both the semifinal and final when play was halted.

"I had a full body cramp (during the state singles final) and it was very painful, but ending on a win is always good," Wolf said. "I wanted to play singles (against Academy), but even in that doubles match I couldn't run."