Collins Weathers the Ojai Competition

It was not a typical Ojai day. In fact, the intermittent thunderstorms, biting wind and lush, green hills turned Ojai into Scotland for a day. All they needed were the bagpipes.

There was a lot of whining from many of the native California tennis players and coaches who are accustomed to blue skies and 80 degrees, but Corona del Mar High’s Parker Collins didn’t seem to mind. Though it took him five hours, thanks to two rain delays, to complete his quarterfinal match, Collins eventually made it through to today’s semifinals of the boys’ interscholstic singles division.

Collins, seeded 11th, took out top-seeded Aaron Tafazoli of L.A. Palisades, 6-3, 6-4, at Thatcher School Friday morning before the rain hit. Then he got some revenge on Point Loma’s Jason Pongsrikul in the afternoon quarterfinal, winning 6-3, 4-6, 6-3, with a beautiful display of serve-and-volley tennis.

“I don’t normally warm up three different times for a match,” said Collins, who will play UC Irvine recruit Zoran Korc of San Marino at 8 a.m. “The match was actually broken up into three phases. We come out and get warm, then cool down, then get loose again.”

After each delay, Collins was able to loosen up before Pongsrikul, who knocked out Collins in the round of 16 here last year. After the first delay, which lasted 90 minutes, Pongsrikul double-faulted twice to give Collins a nearly insurmountable 4-0 third-set lead.

“The delay actually benefited me quite a bit,” Collins said.

But Collins admitted he wouldn’t want to go through a day like Friday all the time.

“You’re thinking about your match throughout the delay,” he said. “You’re pacing, you’re nervous . . . “

But once play began, Collins was fine. All day, he stayed on top of the net, never giving Tafazoli or Pongsrikul much room to maneuver or to pass.

Other county players remaining in the boys’ interscholastic field didn’t fare as well. In the round of 16, Woodbridge’s David Lingman lost to Santa Barbara’s David Warkentin, 6-2, 6-2, and La Quinta’s Robert Chu fell to Pongsrikul, 6-3, 6-2. In the quarterfinals, Los Alamitos’ Cody Jackson lost to second-seeded Philip Sheng of Thousand Oaks, 6-2, 6-2.

In the boys’ interscholastic doubles, Corona del Mar’s Sameer Chopra and Christian Jensen reached the quarterfinals with a 6-4, 6-4 victory over San Marino’s Derek and Dustin Tsu. They lost in the quarterfinals, 6-4, 7-5, to Quinn Borchard and Davey Jones of Oxnard Rio Mesa. Corona del Mar has a chance to win the Griggs Cup, the Ojai team championship. No county team has won the Griggs Cup since 1988, when Woodbridge and Servite shared it with two other teams.

In the girls’ 18 and under doubles, Melissa Esmero of Mater Dei and Adriana Hockicko of Woodbridge reached the finals with a 6-4, 6-0 victory over Luana Magnani of Pasadena and Cheyne Ursich of Rancho Palos Verdes.

Notes

Due to the rain, many of the juniors matches were delayed and some will have to be completed today. . . . In the Pac-10 men’s singles, Stanford junior Geoff Abrams (Newport Harbor) continued his exceptional play by upsetting top-seeded Robert Kendrick of Washington, 6-1, 6-4, in the quarterfinals. He will face Arizona State’s Gustavo Marcaccio in the semifinals. Arizona State sophomore Faye DeVera (Villa Park) reached the semifinals of Pac-10 women’s singles with a 6-2, 6-1 victory over Karoline Borgensen of California. . . . In the Big West women’s tournament, UC Irvine was beaten by University of Pacific, 5-1. Darian Chappell had the only Anteater victory, beating Dina Dajani, 6-2, 6-0. . . . In men’s community college singles, Saddleback’s John Cappello and Marymount’s Boris Turkic, who were teammates at Corona del Mar, will meet in the quarterfinals.