Draw favors La Cañada tennis in easy CIF win
LA CAÑADA — When La Cañada High boys’ tennis Coach Will Moravec saw the draws for the CIF Southern Section Division II playoffs, he said he couldn’t have hoped for anything more.
A favorable draw put the Spartans in a first-round match at home with Golden Valley, a wild-card team, and they took advantage with a 16-2 win Wednesday.
“We’re very fortunate, we got a very good draw,” said Moravec, whose team improved to 12-3 and will face the winner of the Crean Lutheran-Sunny Hills – runner-up teams from the Academy and Freeway league, respectively – match Friday at 3 p.m.
It’s La Cañada’s first postseason victory since 2010 when it advanced to the Division II quarterfinals. From 2011-12, the Spartans were bumped up to Division I.
“When we play at our right level we’re competitive with anyone,” Moravec said. “It feels great because when this group was freshmen we did have expectations we’d go deep in the CIF tournament every year until we got moved to Division I.”
La Cañada received a sweep from senior ace Joshua Kim, 6-0, 6-0, 6-2, and dominant days in doubles as the Spartans swept every set against Golden Valley (9-9) Wednesday.
“It’s good, it’s been since freshman year so it feels really good,” Kim said. “Right now, I think our realistic goal is we want to get to the quarters and we’ll see how it goes from there.”
Pat Finnagin and Nick Malone swept in No. 3 doubles, 6-0, 6-2, 6-0, for the Spartans, who had Joe Song and Liwon Lim post a pair of 6-0 wins before being subbed out for Griffin Amringe and Justin Lee (6-2).
“We had all last week just to practice, so we just worked on our doubles,” said Lim, a senior.
Leeho Lim and Harrison Zuk won both their matches in No. 1 doubles (6-2, 6-1) before being Woo Jin Jung and Chris Walch (6-0) came in for the third round.
La Cañada’s No. 2 Ryan Lee picked up two victories, 6-3, 6-1, playing through an injured wrist he suffered about two weeks ago. Chris Madsen (6-0) and Kobe Ing (6-3) also added victories for La Cañada.
andrew.shortall@latimes.com