Tennis: Huron, Pioneer win Districts to advance to state finals

Both the Huron and Pioneer boys’ tennis teams hosted Districts on Wednesday and both successful programs took full advantage of their home courts.

The River Rats (16-1 overall) defeated both Westland John Glenn and Saline 8-0 in the Division 1 District 3 tournament to advance to the state finals while the Pioneers (17-3-1 overall) defeated Belleville 8-0 and Skyline 5-3 to win D-1 District 4.

The Division 1 State Finals are Oct. 15-17 in the Novi area. The No. 1 singles finals are Oct. 22-24 at Okemos HS.

Huron won all eight matches against Saline in straight sets.

No. 1 singles player Angie Zhou won 6-0, 6-1. At two singles, Andy Andea won 6-1, 6-0. Michael Shi won 6-2, 6-2 at three singles and Nick Pauken won 6-2, 6-0 at four singles.

At one doubles, the Huron team of Aarnav Unadkat and Kevin Joo won 6-4, 6-3. Vincent Tremonti and Aidan Storey won 6-2, 6-1 at two doubles. Rishab Jayaraman and Lee Finger-Myers won 6-0, 6-2 at three doubles and Agosto D’Andrea and Ahmed Hejazi won 6-0, 6-0 at four doubles.

Over at Pioneer, Skyline split the double matches with the host team but lost three of the four singles as Pioneer advances to the state finals with the 5-3 win over the Eagles.

Skyline’s Anthony Van Oyen defeated Stanley Rhodes 6-1, 6-4 at one singles. Pioneer’s Isaac Herrenkohl won 6-2, 6-1 at two singles. Pioneer’s Noah Vogel defeated Arjun Joshi at three singles 6-0, 6-1. At four singles, Corin Tang won 6-3, 6-0 over Daniel Rogers.

At one doubles, the Skyline team of Nikhil Gunaratnam and Alex Verdiyan defeated Sam Berkooz and Jack Aachibald in a very close match 7-6 (3), 3-6, 6-4. At two doubles, Pioneer’s Evan Roopas and Aditya Abbaraju defeated Sam Begosso and Michael Zhou 6-0, 6-2 at two doubles.

At three doubles, Skyline’s duo of Andrew Cooke and Ethan Sung won 6-3, 1-6, 7-5 over Shankrith Chandru and Will Castanier. At four doubles, the Pioneer team of Joseph Alphonso and Alex Roopas defeated Aadith Kumar and Marco Geglio.

The Executive Committee of the Michigan High School Athletic Association approved an adjusted format for this fall’s Lower Peninsula boys tennis postseason to reduce the opportunity for spread of COVID-19 while still awarding team and No. 1 singles champions in four divisions.

The postseason began Wednesday with Team District one-day tournaments to be played during Oct. 7-10 at 16 sites per division. The District champions will advance to the Team Finals in Divisions 1-4 to be played over two days during Oct. 15-17. For each division’s Finals, the first rounds will be played out at four sites before semifinalists converge for the last two rounds.

The following week, during a one-day tournament to be scheduled during Oct. 22-24, 32 No. 1 singles players will compete in bracketed play for the championships in four divisions (eight finalists per division).