Foe Returns to Form, Thwarts Kennedy Pair : Tennis: Drill helps University team post 6-4, 6-4 victory in doubles championship match.

Although he has coached tennis at University High for 20 seasons, Tom Anderson is not above tinkering with his training techniques.

Indeed, it was a last-minute adjustment by Anderson that helped lift University’s Lucas Goldstein and Sung Kim to their first doubles title Wednesday in the City Section Individual Tennis Championships at the Racquet Centre of Universal City.

Kim and Goldstein defeated Josh Etting and Che Naveja of Kennedy, 6-4, 6-4, to claim the championship.

Kim’s service returns, Anderson reasoned, would play a large role in the outcome of the match. Kim, a sophomore, was plagued by erratic returns earlier in the tournament.

In a practice session Tuesday, Anderson suspended a 2 1/2 x 4-foot metal frame from a clothes rack and placed it across the net from Kim. For an hour, Kim aimed his service returns at the hanging target. The drill was akin to a quarterback’s passing a football through a car tire.

The method worked. During Wednesday’s match, Kim told Anderson, “I’m seeing the (practice) box.” Most of his returns were precise, relaxed.

“It was a visualization that was important,” Anderson said. “In high school tennis, if you don’t get your serves and returns in, you’re dead.”

A point to which Etting and Naveja will attest. Naveja, in particular, had problems with serves, double-faulting nine times, including the final point of the match.

“I sensed a feeling of urgency,” Naveja said. “As soon as they got close, all the pressure was put on us. A feeling of desperation.

“Going from one level to the next in two days is really shocking.”

Fifth-seeded Naveja and Etting, who finished the regular season 17-1, advanced to the finals Monday by upsetting the top-seeded team, Sanjay Srinivasan and Jon Faller of Palisades. That momentum continued in the championship match as Naveja and Etting took 2-0 and 3-1 leads in the first set. Goldstein and Kim, 19-0 in the regular season, then surged.

“I thought we were going strong in the first set,” Etting said. “We lost a few crucial deuce points and never got back into it.”

Brothers Nam and Long Nguyen of Cleveland did recover in the third-place match. After losing to Goldstein and Kim in the semifinals, the Nguyens defeated Srinivasan and Faller, 7-5, 5-7, 6-3.

“We weren’t competing for first anymore so we relaxed and played our game,” said Long, who played No. 1 singles during the regular season. “It’s not No. 1, but it’s good enough.”