Making a racket: First week of prep tennis
As an introduction, I’m The Columbian sports staff tennis nut. As much as high school sports reporter Paul Valencia loves his Oakland Raiders, I love tennis. As time allows, my goal is to make covering Clark County high school tennis a weekly feature here on the high school sports blog at 360preps.com.
So any tips, match highlights, photos … feel free to send them along to jeff.klein@columbian.com.
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First stop for me this season was at Prairie on Wednesday to see the Falcons and Camas. The goal each week is to regularly visit an area tennis match to collect images of the season and provide some color to the blog, and perhaps print products. (Tip: Click on the photos to make them BIGGER.)
Camas No. 1 singles Jon Ho in action vs. Prairie’s Erik Saylor on Wednesday, Sept. 10, 2014. (Jeff Klein photo)
Prairie’s No. 1 Erik Saylor in action vs. Camas’ Jon Ho on Wednesday, Sept. 10, 2014. (Jeff Klein photo)
Jon Ho won this match vs. Erik Saylor, but Saylor made it a battle coming back to force a second set tiebreaker. The match lasted about 1 hour, 20 minutes before Ho prevailed 6-0, 7-6 (6).
Playing No. 2 singles for Prairie, sophomore Seth Tripp on Wednesday, Sept. 10, 2014. (Jeff Klein photo)
Playing No. 2 singles for Camas, JJ Jung on Wednesday, Sept. 10, 2014. (Jeff Klein photo)
No. 2 singles went into a third set between Prairie’s Seth Tripp and Camas’ JJ Jung. They were the last varsity match in action at 5 p.m. Wednesday, and Tripp went on to win 2-6, 7-5, 6-2.
Camas won the team match 5-1.
For the complete match results, please refer to our high school scoreboard for Sept. 11, 2014.
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Tennis is a popular as ever among the Clark County schools. Camas coach Jonathan Burton said he has 60 boys out this fall. Prairie coach Chris Linquist said she has 35 players on her team this fall. Word is, most bigger schools have in excess of 30 players on their teams.
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This was the first week of competition for boys tennis teams. Of matches reported on Monday, Columbia River defeated Hudson’s Bay 4-2; Prairie defeated R.A. Long 4-2; and Mark Morris defeated Fort Vancouver 6-0.
Matches reported Wednesday (aside from Camas-Prairie as previously discussed) also included Union 5, Columbia River 1, and Skyview 6, Hudson’s Bay 0.
Once more results begin to roll in, look to this blog for team standings and individual statistics.
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The Mountain View Jamboree is Thursday, Sept. 11 and will be played on Camas’ eight courts. Mountain View coach Mat Clark said the WIAA allows for a tiny window for “jamborees”, and this is it. Mountain View, Skyview, Camas and Prairie are participating.
“It is a great preseason event that doesn’t count and really is not advertised, but proves to be a good season kick-off nonetheless,” Clark said in an email.
The event begins at 3:30 p.m. … and again … Mountain View is host but matches are at CAMAS!
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Skyview’s three-time WIAA state girls singles champion Sammi Hampton played in the qualifying tournament for the USTA Pro Circuit $25,000 Challenger at Redding, Calif., this week. Hampton, competing as an amateur, needed two wins to get into the main draw. She won her first match over Sabastiani Leon of Mexico 4-6, 6-4, 7-5. However, Hampton was then eliminated by Karla Popovic of Croatia 6-1, 7-6 (5).
In rankings released on Sept. 10, Hampton remains the No. 1 player in the USTA Pacific Northwest Section for girls 18s. Jen Lewis of Camas, WIAA state doubles champion, is ranked No. 6.
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Again, please email any tennis highlights, photos or comments to jeff.klein@columbian.com. I’ll make an effort to get them in. The more to work with, the better.
