CV nets home victory over La Salle
LA CRESCENTA — With little opportunity to squeeze in a nonleague match, the Crescenta Valley High and La Salle boys’ tennis teams found an opening in their respective schedules to meet.
Thanks to a solid all-around performance from Crescenta Valley’s doubles teams, the Falcons posted a 17-1 home win Wednesday afternoon.
Crescenta Valley (5-7) swept all nine doubles sets to improve to 4-1 in its last five matches. La Salle, which won the Del Rey League championship last season, dropped to 8-6.
Crescenta Valley’s No. 2 doubles team of Patrick Chong and Patrick Meserkhani swept, 7-6 (7-4), 6-0, 6-0.
While the Lancers could only notch a 6-4 singles victory from Morgan Schoefield, La Salle Coach Tim Pawley said the Lancers look for certain things when partaking in a nonleague match.
“I like us to play up [in divisions] in nonleague against some of the good teams,” said Pawley, whose team suffered a 16-2 nonleague loss Tuesday against host Arcadia, ranked No. 2 in the latest CIF Southern Section Division II poll. “It gets them prepared to do better individually and in league and they get to see what reality is playing teams [from higher divisions].
“They’ve competed and it’s a raw team. I’m OK with where we are and we want to get up in our league.”
The Falcons, who are also in Division II, entered Wednesday’s match fresh off a 10-8 Pacific League win against visiting Hoover on Tuesday, giving the Falcons some extra confidence competing against the Lancers, a Division V program.
Crescenta Valley struggled early in the season with some players sick or injured. That forced Crescenta Valley Coach Sarah Wiggins to constantly juggle lineup combinations in singles and doubles.
“We had the flu going around, so we had to mix things up,” said Wiggins, who saw her No. 3 doubles team of Daniel Cha and Justin Chung sweep, 6-2, 6-2, 6-0. “We didn’t want to, but everything happened.
“So, we went with the best combinations and we tried to find the best chemistry. Something just clicked.”
On Wednesday, Chong and Meserkhani worked together to complete a sweep, with two sets taking less than 30 minutes to complete.
“We try to support each other and we’ve been good at getting in our first serves and being able to attack the net,” Chong said. “On the tiebreaker, we were down, 6-5, and I was serving. We felt like we could get that win and we would have momentum.”
Crescenta Valley No. 2 singles player Albert Chtchyan swept, 6-0, 6-0, 6-3. The Falcons also received singles victories from Simon Park (6-2), Young Peak (6-3), Mheir Grigor (6-2) and Doil Kim (6-0).
Crescenta Valley’s No. 1 doubles team of James Oh and Greg Manoucheri teamed up for 6-4, 6-1 wins. Oh and Allen Chang worked together for a 6-4 victory.
