Naperville Central's Sterrett, Bauman still going at state
Jimmy Li, Gordon Zhang and the No. 1 doubles team from Naperville Central are still alive and well going into the third and final day of the 95th boys tennis state tournament.
Li and Zhang rebounded in style Friday after falling in their opening match in the championship round to win two matches in the backdraw, putting them in contention for a state medal and a top-five finish.
The Redhawks' Billy Sterrett-Kevin Bauman (30-7) stormed back after their disappointing loss to New Trier (Hiltzik-Mang) early Friday morning to claim a pair of marathon victories and will face 9-16 seed Highland Park (Manci-Hainsfurther) at 8 a.m. today at Prospect High School.
"We're still going," said Naperville Central coach Dan Brown, following his doubles team's 7-6 (4), 7-5 win over Springfield to move one step closer to playing at tourney host Hersey and in front of another big crowd.
"New Trier was just ripping shots - with the type of shots that we haven't really seen this season, which never really allowed us to get back into the match," Sterrett said after he and his teammate fell in the round of 16 to the 3-4 seed, 6-4, 6-3.
"That (first) game of the first set was our best opportunity to break New Trier," said Brown, "but they kept pounding their ground strokes and we just couldn't answer them. But the great thing about this tournament is the opportunity to pick yourself back up and get after it in the backdraw, and those guys really did a good job of doing that today."
Naperville Central closed out St. Charles North 6-4, 3-6, 7-6 (2) before ending the tournament for Springfield by breaking, holding, and then breaking the 9-16 seed.
Both Li (33-4) and Zhang (27-8) were unable to slow two of the best singles players in the state Friday morning, but neither refused to concede in the backdraw.
Li, a senior from Wheaton Warrenville South, lost in the round of 16 to top seed Robert Stineman of New Trier before firing back with a straight-sets victory over Eric Pontow of Sandburg and topping 5-8 seed Rafe Mosetick of Hinsdale Central 7-6 (4), 7-6 (5). That gives Li a shot today at Josh Cogan (32-1) of Batavia, who lost to defending state champion Blake Bazarnik in the championship quarterfinals.
Li, along with the upset of the No. 2 seed in doubles (Ravella-Bloom) by Fremd (Shimizu-Kreis) helped damage Hinsdale Central's hopes of a fourth straight state crown.
Zhang fell in straight sets to Bazarnik in his first match of the day, then came back to win his next two and will be the lone player from Naperville North still on the board after teammates Reid Mutschler-Elliot Giraud (29-10) saw their run end in the seventh round of the consolation bracket play to 5-8 seed Stevenson (Brej-Buxbaum).
"We missed a lot of easy shots, and in that second set (with Highland Park) we just couldn't hold service," Mutschler said after he and Giraud fell to the 3-4 seed (Zak-Brint) in straight sets.
"North was a big and imposing team, which also happened to be very athletic, so we were careful not to let get on a roll on us," said Highland Park coach Steve Rudman.
Zhang, a sophomore, will face junior Ben Quazzo (Latin, 26-4) at 8 a.m. today. Zhang nearly took Stineman to three sets in his quarterfinal at Hersey.
Freshman Eric Marbach (Waubonsie Valley) is done after dropping a long three-set match with four-time state qualifier and 2009 state doubles medalist Danny Park (Guilford) after going 3-2. Also finished is Devin Moore (Wheaton Academy), who was terrific in his third appearance here, his first in singles play.
New Trier leads Hinsdale Central by 38-35 heading into the final day, while Neuqua Valley and Naperville North are eighth and ninth, respectively. Neuqua earned 11 of its 18 points from its doubles teams, with Skeeter Plowman-Patrick Carpio going 4-2 over two days, and Tyler Wall-Andy Frandsen doing the same.