Worsnop again into finals
Momentum changed quickly on Thursday for junior tennis player Mackenzie Worsnop.
Worsnop, a Newport Beach resident, seemed to be in control of her girls’ 18 singles semifinal match against her friend Layla Rodriguez of Rancho Santa Margarita in the first set. But a 5-2 lead suddenly turned into Rodriguez winning the first set, 7-5.
Worsnop, the No. 3 seed, had to bounce back quickly against the No. 2-seeded Rodriguez, at the 26th annual The Tennis Club Junior Tournament, better known as the “War by the Shore.” The heat was on in more ways than one, as the match was held on court No. 5 of The Tennis Club, which contained no shade in the mid-afternoon sun for players or spectators.
“I just told myself I just needed to refocus on trying to improve, versus thinking about winning,” Worsnop said. “Every time I thought about winning, I just immediately started to fall down.”
At the end of the match, though, she could stand tall after earning a 5-7, 6-4, 6-4 victory to advance to the girls’ 18 finals for the second straight year.
There was some good natured small-talk from the respective families after Worsnop earned the win. Her matches against Rodriguez have always been close. Usually it is Rodriguez, who trains with Worsnop at Dent Tennis Academy, who comes out on top in the marathon matches.
“These two are known for this,” Worsnop’s mom, Kimberly, said after her daughter earned the victory.
Mackenzie Worsnop, a finalist in the girls’ 16s at the War by the Shore last year, will play top-seeded Whitney Weisberg of Redlands in the 18s title match on Friday at 11 a.m. at The Tennis Club.
Worsnop does not really know Weisberg, which wasn’t the case against Rodriguez. After the two players split the first two sets, Rodriguez appeared to have the advantage in the third with a 2-1, 40-love lead.
But Worsnop somehow came back to win that game, getting back on serve, and eventually took the lead.
Worsnop’s serve was broken serving for the match at 5-3, but she immediately responded to break back to end the match.
“It was really hard for me to overcome [playing a friend] today,” Worsnop said. “I was just battling it the whole time, and it never ended the whole match. I just had to try so hard to not think about that I knew her, just think about what I needed to do to improve.”
After the match, Worsnop talked to another Dent player, Jacob Holiday of Costa Mesa. The No. 8-seeded Holiday wasn’t as fortunate in his boys’ 16 singles semifinal match, as he lost to No. 2-seeded Ryan Dehmoubed of Cardiff, 6-3, 6-1.
“Walking in, I knew it was definitely winnable, but also it was going to be a tough match,” Holiday said of playing Dehmoubed. “He’s seeded No. 2 for a reason. He beat me today because he was more consistent than I was. He was just a little bit more mentally tough than me. I don’t think he had my forehand, I don’t think he had my backhand, I don’t think he had my serve. But what he did have, he did it much better than me …. I wanted to pull the trigger too soon, and he knew that.”
But it was a good tournament for Holiday, a 16-year-old who is homeschooled. He has been losing early in some tournaments lately, he said.
“Lately I’ve been losing first and second round,” said Holiday, who is taking a holiday himself this weekend to Lake Havasu. “This is the first tournament in three or four that I was able to pull myself off my feet.”
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•Several other local junior players fell in War by the Shore semifinal matches Thursday.
No. 2-seeded Emin Torlic, who will be a freshman at Sage Hill School, fell to Alejandro Serrano in a boys’ 14 singles semifinal match, 3-6, 6-0, 6-0.
No. 2-seeded Lauren Friedman of Newport Beach lost to Danielle Tuhten of Canada in a girls’ 12 singles semifinal match, 6-1, 6-1.
Newport Coast resident Paul Dandler lost a tight boys’ 10 singles semifinal match to No. 4-seeded Aden Dorros of La Jolla. Dorros won, 4-6, 6-2 and 11-9 in the third-set super-tiebreaker.
Dandler will be a fifth-grader at Seashore Academy, a small Mandarin Chinese and Spanish Immersion school. He fell behind 9-6 in the super-tiebreaker before saving three match points. However, Dorros was able to win the next two points and take the match.
