Boys’ Tennis: Sailors move on

When talking about the Newport Harbor High boys’ tennis team, Coach Kristen Case highlights three facets.

The Sailors have good character, are selfless in nature and united.

The attributes are related, yet they can help determine why this has been the best Newport boys’ tennis team in years.

“They don’t want to let each other down,” Case said. “They want to do well for one another. They lift each other up, empower each other. It’s a special thing to watch and very fun to coach.”

Newport Harbor led just 8-7 late in Wednesday’s CIF Southern Section Division 1 first-round playoff match against Calabasas. It was gut-check time, and the players responded yet again.

They won the last three doubles sets to earn an 11-7 win at home. Newport Harbor moves on to the second round of CIF for the first time since 2010.

The Sailors will play host to No. 2-seeded Beverly Hills on Friday in the second round, weather permitting. Rain is in the forecast for Friday, so the match could be played Saturday.

Beverly Hills defeated St. Francis, 16-2, in another first-round match Wednesday. The Sailors believe they have a shot to upset the Normans.

“I know they’re the [No.] 2 seed and they’ve had a few good wins, but I don’t know if the other schools had their top guys [for those matches],” Newport Harbor senior Reese Stalder said. “We have no pressure, and it’s at home.”

Newport Harbor (18-3) also has had a few good wins. The Sailors finished second in the rugged Sunset League and hard to earn that spot, edging Fountain Valley 10-8 and 9-9 on games, as well as earning 11-7 and 10-8 wins over Marina.

“They’ve done a phenomenal job all season long, just competing,” Case said. “I’m so proud of how they come out and compete every single match.”

The TCU-bound Stalder certainly does that. The Sunset League singles champion improved to 60-0 this season by sweeping Wednesday, including a 6-4 win over Calabasas’ top player, senior Bruce Man-Son-Hing.

The sophomore doubles team of David Lee and Mark Schaefer also swept for the Sailors, who led 4-2 after the first round and 7-5 after two rounds. But it got interesting.

Calabasas Coach Gerald Mathews subbed in freshman Kyle Spiegelman in singles, and Spiegelman rallied for a 6-4 win over Newport sophomore David Sharp. That narrowed the Sailors’ lead over the Coyotes to 8-7.

Newport Harbor had the answer in doubles. Lee and Schaefer topped Calabasas’ Suraj Srivats and Adam Nebell, 6-0, to give the Sailors their ninth set win. It clinched the match, as Newport had an insurmountable 67-53 games advantage at the time.

“They’ve really stepped up this season,” Case said of Lee and Schaefer, who were league runners-up in doubles. “They didn’t start playing together in preseason. Through preseason we were going back and forth between two different lineups, and we ended up keeping their combo together and using that lineup. It just kept getting better and better every week. Those two are good friends off the court. They’re both very humble and work very hard, and that’s why they keep improving.”

Up 9-7, the Sailors also won the last two sets for good measure. Senior co-captain David Schaefer and freshman Andy Myers rallied to beat Danny Ryngler and Jake Nudell, 6-4. Then senior co-captain Ryan Young and sophomore Sam Leaman beat Calabasas’ Blake Berlinger and Joe Guss by the same score.

Young and Leaman, as well as David Schaefer and Myers, each won twice in doubles for the Sailors. Junior Gavin Leonard won the other set for Newport Harbor, in singles.

“Going into the season, we really weren’t sure how it was going to pan out,” Young said. “I wasn’t expecting us to do this well. But after [a team bonding trip to] Big Bear and having our first couple of matches, we realized we’ve got this brotherhood going on, going throughout every court. It helps us get those [close] matches and play our best.”

Man-Son-Hing and Ori Mizrahi both won twice in singles for Calabasas (10-5), the second-place team from the Marmonte League. Calabasas first-year Coach Gerald Mathews said his team was playing without its top doubles player, Allen Sokolov, who was taking the AP Statistics test Wednesday.

Still, Mathews was diplomatic after the match.

“It’s something we couldn’t get around,” Mathews said of Sokolov’s AP test. “Other than that, it was a great battle. We fought a great team. They were very respectful and a good group of guys, so I hope they felt like we gave them a good battle and they had a fun challenge. Hopefully we got them ready for the next round.”

The battle-tested Sailors do feel ready, David Schaefer said.

“Anything can happen any day,” he said. “Really, we can beat any team out there.”