By Staff Writers Waylon Li & Aaryan Suri
Despite falling short of a consecutive NCS Championship title, Junior Himani Malur won first at the MVALs Individual Tournament in singles while Co-Captain Megha Hegde and Freshman Hannah Bi won in doubles, qualifying them for a chance at the NCS Individual Title. With grueling sets and tough opponents, Co-Captain Junior Megha Hegde and Freshman Hannah Bi took second place at the NCS Doubles Tournament.
During the regular season, the team focused on honing specific fundamentals and techniques, such as volleys, groundstrokes, and serves. “We both trained really hard to get to where we are today, and it’s great that it has paid off,” Bi said. Besides physical training, the team worked just as hard to emotionally support one another through tough matches and moments. “Everyone supported each other throughout the ups and downs of the season,” Hegde said.
Despite the team’s strong chemistry, they also had their fair share of shortcomings in terms of adaptability. “I think we need to work more on strategy, because at the end [of the tournament], I feel like we became one-dimensional. We have to work on being more multi-dimensional within our game,” Girls Tennis Coach Michael Jan said.
Throughout all of their games, Bi and Hegde’s journey to second place presented itself with many ups and downs. They cruised through their first two matches, winning 6-0, 6-3, and 6-3, 6-0 against American Canyon and Campolindo High School respectively. With an undisturbed flawless win against Monte Vista High School 6-0, 6-0, Bi and Hegde bulldozed through to the final, but fell short to Dougherty Valley High School 1-6, 3-6. In the singles section, Junior Himani Malur fell short in the first round, losing 5-7, 3-6 to Tamalpais High School. On a similar note, the team also suffered a heartbreaking 2-5 loss to Foothill High School, which eliminated them from the teams NCS Championship quarterfinals, the team has learned lots from this year’s season, and combined with the young yet experienced roster, is looking at a chance at redemption next year.
Moving forward from this year’s NCS tournament, with their sights on the 2023-24 season. Next year, the team hopes to come back to the NCS stage with a much more developed roster and dominate. “It’s easy to live off the glory days of two years ago. But we have a new team, we have a new goal, we’ve got to find our strengths, find our weaknesses, and develop back to what we can truly be.” Jan said.
Cover image by Co-Web Editor Jennie Wang
