By Ayden Vasquez
A 5-0 sweep against Santa Barbara City College in the first round of the 3C2A SoCal Regional on April 9 propelled the Riverside City College men’s tennis team to the next round of playoffs.
With Santa Barbara having an uneventful 5-7 record on the season, the Tigers agreed that while not the strongest team, the Vaqueros would be a good warmup for the next round .
Despite knowing that they were the stronger team, RCC continued with tenacity and still played hard.
“We as a team talked beforehand and wanted to establish that even if Santa Barbara wasn’t the toughest of opponents, we would still play like they were,” captain Emilio Real said.
His teammates follow the same ideology, playing hard until the very end.
“We dominated today and I attribute that to my guys taking what we said as a group to heart,” Real said.
Starting off the day with three doubles matches, RCC would go on to sweep each one. The wins put pressure on Santa Barbara very early on which would lead to the team making mistakes in key moments.
“With this new ‘clinch’ format, which is when the first team to 5 points wins, we knew that if we dominated doubles it would give us the momentum we needed to finish off strong in singles and move on to the next round,” head coach Evan Parry said.
Going into their single matches, the Tigers were ready to use the momentum gained from sweeping all their previous doubles matches to their advantage.
One of the most interesting matches came from the Tigers second-ranked singles player, freshman Micheal Chang. Giving it his all, Chang would clinch the last point of the day, clinching not only his singles match and helping complete the sweep of the Vaqueros but keeping RCC’s playoff hopes alive.
“Towards the end, I felt like I wasn’t pushing hard enough on my forehand swings,” Chang said. “Luckily I was able to finish out strong nonetheless. I feel kind of tired, but I helped my team finish off the day strong with a win.”
With a more promising team, as well as better seeding, Riverside now looks to the future as they prepare for what’s to come.
“Next week is all I can think about right now,” Parry said. “All me and my boys can do now is practice as we wait for who we got next.”
The Tigers will continue to keep their playoff hopes alive as they travel to Ventura College this week for the second round of the 3C2A SoCal Regional playoffs.
