BY NATHANIEL MATA | SPECIAL TO THE MONITOR
Rio Grande Valley tennis players and coaches anxiously awaited Monday afternoon, when they would find out their seeds and opponents for the start of the regional tournaments.
The tournaments will get underway today and will conclude Wednesday. The 6A matches will be held at the McFarlin Center while 5A will compete at North East ISD Tennis Center, both in San Antonio.
Roma doubles aims to keep winning
The Roma Gladiators are coming to the regional tournament with no shortage of experience. Coach Eddie Marquez has a girls doubles team and two boys doubles teams competing.
The girls duo of Chantal Lozano and Monika Cantu were in San Antonio for regionals last year, as singles qualifiers for Roma. They are seeded fourth and will play Jackie Carr/Halle Romero of Calallen.
District champion boys doubles team of Joel Lorea and Joel Flores will also be in action.
Roma doubles will use those experiences but be ready for even stronger play this week.
“It’s a tough tournament,” Marquez said. “There’s some big names out there. I told the kids, ‘It really doesn’t matter if you’re seeded or not. You’re just going to have to play your best to get to the next level. You’re going to have to show up and prove who you are all over again.’”
“They know they’re up against some stiff competition. They’ve been training all year long. To them, it’s second nature. They already know their expectations. They know the competition. They want to prove to everyone that they belong up here.”
Mixed doubles duo Leonardo Armendariz and Carolina Falcon of Sharyland High will hope to carry district championship momentum into regionals. They are matched up with Victoria East in the opening round.
Mora golden in first year.
McAllen Rowe’s Anna Mora is a district champion as a freshman. The Lady Warrior defeated McAllen High’s Camila Gonzalez last week.Now it’s Mora’s first go at the regional tournament, where the 15-year-old will test her skill level against Region IV’s top players.
“I tell her that because it’s a different level of competition, it doesn’t mean that she needs to be a different person to play,” Rowe coach Bryan Garcia said. “Her best game is still enough to win the matches she needs to win.”
Mora will face Samantha Butler from San Antonio Clark in her first regional match.
Rowe also has two girls doubles teams in action, including District 30-6A champions Lizbeth Alvarez and Jennifer Alvarado.
Garcia’s message to his girls is to play with composure.
“They just have to relax,” Garcia said. “Most of the time, what throws them off is when they think too much. They’re worried about their score, or worried about their opponent. Tennis is an all-year sport, so these are things that you train all year, and you just apply it on the court.”
Super Singles
Also at the 6A regional meet at the McFarlin Center, McAllen Memorial’s Jack Wang will be seeded third in the boys singles bracket. The senior will compete to try to reach the state tournament for the second year in a row. He was a regional finalist last year, but two other singles players rank above him in UTR, or Universal Tennis Rating.
Wang’s first-round match will be an RGV showdown against San Benito’s Derrick Layton. The Greyhound finished second at the 32-6A district meet and looks to upset the Valley’s top 6A singles player.
Sharyland Pioneer’s Joaquin Delgado is the second seed heading into the regional tournament. Last season, he finished runner-up in San Antonio. He followed up that performance with another silver, this time at state.
Delgado will face Luke Nelson from Fulshear in his opening round.
Edinburg Vela’s Victoria Villanueva will face Harlingen High’s Skylar Snell in yet another Valley matchup in the first round.
District 32-5A is sending a pair of familiar faces to the regional tournament.
For the third straight year, Jennifer Garcia and Crystal Werbiski are advancing as regional qualifiers in girls singles.
Mercedes’s Werbiski will again have an uphill battle to make it out of the first round. She drew the No. 1 seed for the third season in a row. This year, that is Jayci Goldsmith of Dripping Springs.
Garcia, the Donna High junior, has the district titles to show for the last three years of head-to-head battles with Werbiski in the district championship match. Garcia prevailed again this year, winning the match 6-2, 6-4.
She’ll start in the middle of the bracket with a more favorable path. She opens with District 31-5A runner-up Eugenia Gomez from Sharyland High.
All competitors are vying for a spot at the state meet May 18-19 in College Station.