Local Players Fall During Black Friday

The boys’ interscholastic singles field seemed to be bursting with county players who had legitimate chances to win the tournament. As many as five players appeared good enough to win the most prestigious of the Ojai Valley Tennis Tournament’s junior events.

But Friday afternoon none of those five, or any other upstarts, remained in the draw.

Wednesday afternoon, Dana Hills’ Brandon Fallon, who reached the interscholastic semifinals last year, withdrew because of tendinitis in his right elbow. Thursday, Laguna Beach’s Aaron Talarico, who had beaten Fallon this season, fell to Agoura’s Ruby Dillon, 7-6, 6-4, in the second round.

Then a hot, sunny afternoon turned into black Friday at Thacher School for Sunny Hills’ Chris Chung, Foothill’s Joost Hol and Servite’s Ryan Moore. All three had tough tasks in their quarterfinal matches against higher-ranked opponents, but all three also had excellent opportunities to win.

None of them, however, played consistently enough to pull through.

Chung was facing Southern California’s top-ranked junior in the boys’ 18s last year, Sam Adam Webster of Santa Barbara. Chung got out of the blocks slowly, trailing 5-1, but fought his way back to 5-5 in the first set before losing, 7-5, 6-7, (7-4), 6-2.

As the 2-hour 30-minute match ran into the second and third sets, it appeared every couple points Chung would chastise himself for reaching a new low.

“I don’t think I’ve ever double-faulted this many times in my life,” said Chung, who afterward said he probably had 15.

Webster, who hadn’t played Chung in four years, was happy to take advantage of Chung’s misfortunes.

“He missed a lot,” Webster said. “I heard him say he’d never hit his forehand so poorly.”

Webster might get a chance to see a different version of Chung next year in the Big West Conference. Webster has signed with Boise State and Chung is deciding between California and UC Irvine. Webster will play for former UCI Coach Greg Patton.

Hol is only a junior but he was aware that UCLA Coach Billy Martin and UCI Coach Steve Clark were watching his match against Fresno Bullard’s Robert Kendrick, the top player in the Northern California section. Kendrick won, 6-3, 7-6 (7-4), handing Hol his first loss at Ojai. He won the boys’ 16s two years ago and withdrew last year because of food poisoning after winning two matches.

“I cooked my own food and slept in a tent this year,” Hol joked.

Hol said it was easy keeping his loss to Kendrick in perspective.

“These eight guys here [in the quarterfinals] are like a national team,” he said. “Everybody’s tough. There’s no shame to lose.”

Moore wasn’t able to laugh or talk about his loss to Beverly Hills junior Jose Lieberman. But Moore’s frustration was understandable. He had five set points at 6-5 in the first set, then went up 4-0 in the tiebreaker before losing, 7-6 (9-7), 6-4.

“When I was down, 6-5, I kept kick-serving to his backhand and that seemed to work,” Lieberman said. “I wanted to keep the ball deep and stay loose with him.”

In the girls’ 18s singles tournament, Villa Park’s Faye DeVera reached the semifinals with easy victories over Huntington Beach’s Allison Arvizu and Westlake’s Helena Horak.

She might have started a new fashion trend. DeVera wore electric blue boys’ swimming trunks as a tennis skirt. In this morning’s 9:30 semifinal match against Ilona Kordonskaya of Los Angeles, DeVera will wear purple trunks.

Notes

In the girls’ 14 singles, three county players advanced to today’s semifinals, Newport Beach’s Alexandra McGoodwin, Dana Point’s Amerly Tantee and Laguna Beach’s Ashley Maddocks . . . In the boys’ 16 singles, Los Alamitos’ Cody Jackson reached the semifinals with a 6-1, 6-1 victory over Thousand Oaks’ Jeffrey Linneman . . . Mater Dei’s Melissa Esmero lost to Corona del Mar’s Caylan Leslie, 6-4, 7-5, in the girls’ 16 singles quarterfinals . . . In the boys’ interscholastic doubles quarterfinals, Woodbridge’s Greg Levy and Brandon Shainfeld lost to top-seeded Erin Carroll and Joe Chrisman of Ventura, 6-3, 6-2. Sergey Kordonskey and Danny Westerman of Pacific Palisades, beat and Santa Margarita’s Cody Shedd and Derek Tsu, 2-6, 6-3, 6-3. . . UCLA freshman Kevin Kim (Sunny Hills High) was eliminated from the Pac-10 singles tournament by USC’s George Bastl, 6-3, 6-2, in the quarterfinals, but he and his partner Eric Lin, formerly of Canyon High, defeated Cal’s David Sutton and Chris Santoso, 4-6, 7-6, 7-5, to reach today’s Pac-10 doubles semifinals . . . In the women’s open singles, Woodbridge senior Natalie Exon reached the semifinals by defeating defending champion Denise Valentin of Phoenix, 7-5, 6-3. . . . Joe Gilbert, a Boise State freshman who attended Sunny Hills High, advanced to the men’s independent singles semifinals and will play UC Santa Barbara’s Cory Guy today. . . Geoff Abrams, a Stanford freshman who played at Newport Harbor, plays UCLA’s Brandon Kramer in the semifinals of the Pac-10 invitational singles tournament.