On March 26, Aragon boys tennis (6-1 overall) defeated San Mateo (4-3 overall) 6-1, continuing their great season.
The team went into the game with confidence, having beaten San Mateo the previous year. They’ve also had a good season so far other than their match against Burlingame.
“We’ve been winning most of our matches,” said senior and No. 2 doubles Ziv Rapoport. “We had a surprising loss against Burlingame, but it’s good because they also lost to [Menlo-Atherton], so it was a rock- paper- scissors situation, since we beat [Menlo-Atherton].”
A contributing factor to their success was the presence of most of last year’s team configuration. After the graduation of last year’s senior class, only two seniors had left. However, they knew San Mateo was a good team and expected it to be a tough game.
“It’ll test us, and I think we’re good enough to beat them, we just have to play well, “ said head coach Dave Owdom.
Additionally, some promising freshmen also joined the team this season, adding to the strength of the team.
“[A lot of our players] are … freshmen, “ Owdom said. “They’re really good, and they can’t make the starting lineup but [they’re] gonna play a little.”
Despite the dominant score, Aragon won many of the matches by a small margin or in a super tiebreaker.
“Even though it looks like 6-1 is a very good score … [there were] a lot of very close matches,” Owdom said.
In No. 1 doubles, seniors Thomas Nie and Jack He ultimately had to play in a super tiebreaker after they lost the first set 1-6 and won the second 7-5. After an intense match, they narrowly lost the super tiebreaker at 7-10.
In No. 3 doubles, senior Justin Wong and freshman Adam Beg also had to participate in a super tiebreaker after they won the first set 6-1 and lost the second 5-7. They were able to win it by a comfortable amount at 10-3.
Owdom was particularly impressed by their comeback.
“You never know how they’re going to react when you have a big lead, you lose it, you lose the set and you [have] to play another [tiebreaker],” Owdom said. “So that mental toughness, [I’m] very happy about that.”
Senior Keiya Wada also won his match against San Mateo’s No. 4 singles, winning each set consistently at 6-2. However, he believes that the large difference between scores can be misleading.
“The scores might not show it,” Wada said. “But a lot of the games are deuce games. So I would say it was pretty close.”
Wada attributes his win to good strategy. He was able to find the opponent’s weak and strong points when they were warming up.
“I was able to figure out that he had a weak backhand side,” Wada said. “So I was … distributing more of my balls to his backhand side, so that I can get easier points that way.”
One of the matches with a larger margin between scores was No. 1 singles. Senior Akbar Beg racked up a stable win of 6-2 in both sets. Despite that, his game progressed slowly, especially in the first set. Beg was one of the last singles to finish.
No. 2 singles player and junior Veraaz Khan won by a complete shutout in the first set. Conversely, the second set was much closer after his opponent reset and went on to play much better. They were neck-and-neck, but Khan still won the set and the match with a score of 6-4.
In No. 3 singles, junior Darrin O’Brien dominated his opponent in both sets at 6-1, resulting in another win for Aragon.
By far the longest match was No. 2 doubles. Junior Max Gan and Rapoport won the first set, scoring 7-5. For the second set, the two teams tied at 6-6, resulting in a tiebreak. Aragon won the tiebreak and the match, finishing the game on a good note for them.
While Owdom is happy about the victory, he feels that there are definitely parts of the game they can improve.
“[Our] doubles … need to get a lot better at the net and keeping the ball in play,” Owdom said.
The team will be working hard to improve, especially in preparation for their rematch against Burlingame. Their next match will be away against Menlo Atherton on April 15 at 4 p.m.
