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By Marcus Clarke
By Marcus Clarke
The Riverside City College tennis team has played extremely well all season long.
The RCC men’s team performed extremely well at the Southern California tournament winning the tournament in both singles and doubles play - a first in the college’s history.
Daniel Coelho won in singles play then teamed up with Yair Banuelos to win doubles.
Mt. San Jacinto shocked Riverside in the first round of the tournament. The eagles, the south’s no. 5 seed, beat the tigers 5-4, but the Tigers were resilient.
Riverside became dominant in Southern California taking 5 of the 8 spots for singles regional’s and 3 of the 8 spots for doubles.
The finals were a battle of RCC teams in both singles and doubles.
Coelho continued on his hot streak through the Ojai tournament, cruising through the finals before beating Ventura Colleges Hussan Abbas 5-2.
Coelho joins Steve Kluse as the only singles players in school history to win the Ojai tournament.
Kluse did it in 1982.
Although the Ojai tournament was a non-qualifying tournament it was a chance for all the top tennis players at the community college level in Southern California to show their talent and RCC did not disappoint.
Although Yair Banuelos, Riverside’s No. 1 singles player was eliminated in the semifinals of the singles tournament by College of the Desert’s Tiago Hayashi, Coelho beat Hayashi in three sets (6-4) (2-5) (7-6).
Riverside took the Ojai cup, which marks the first time in school history the RCC Tigers have won the team title.
Riverside went a perfect 12-0 in the Orange Coast Conference. Next up for the Tigers was the State tournament May 8-10.
Daniel Coelho won the state championship, while Yair Banuelos made it all the way to the semi-final round.
