It ‘May’be the busiest month

I admit badminton does not get a lot of coverage. OK. No coverage, but that doesn’t mean those athletes don’t work just as hard as baseball and softball players. Last weekend, the CCS badminton championships were held and, while there were no Peninsula Athletic League players who earned section titles, the PAL was still well represented with a number of top-10 finishes.

Additionally, four PAL teams finished in the top-15 of the 33-team team standings. Mills finished eighth, Aragon 10th, Carlmont 11th and San Mateo 12th.

Carlmont’s Micah Cheng, and the San Mateo girls’ doubles team of Alex Young and Vivian Shi had the best finishes. Cheng took third in the girls’ singles bracket, while Young and Shi were third in girls’ doubles.

In the third-place match, Cheng, the third seed, needed three sets to get past Milpitas’ Arida Narayan, 21-12, 13-21, 21-12. Cheng rolled through her first two opponents, losing a total of 20 points over four sets. She fell in the semifinals to Palo Alto’s Eva Wang, but put up a fight before losing 17-21, 20-22.

Young and Shi were the fourth seed in girls’ doubles and cruised into the semifinals following a pair of straight-set wins. They fell to eventual champions, top-seeded Sumaswara and Suneri Chinthalapati of Valley Christian, but rebounded to beat Cupertino’s Prutha Bharadwaj and Natalee Lam, 21-15, 17-21, 21-15 in the third-place match.

The Aragon boys’ doubles team of Derek Nan and William Ye finished fourth, falling to Palo Alto’s Brandon Han and Justin Han in the third-place match, 18-21, 13-21. The Aragon duo came into the tournament as the top seed and won their first two matches before falling to the fourth-seeded team from Mountain View in a semifinal match. The Han brothers were seeded second.

Mills had a pair of mixed doubles teams advance to the final matches of the day. Alex Sin and Charlotte Tse finished fourth, losing to a team from Milpitas in three sets, 9-21, 21-15, 17-21.

The Vikings’ team of Caden and Becky Liu took eighth place, beating a team from Cupertino, 21-11, 22-24, 21-11.

South City’s Benson Ngai and Carlmont’s Ian Shi met in the 7th-8th place game in boys’ singles, with Ngai coming away with a 21-16, 21-15 victory.

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In the CCS boys’ team tennis tournament, Menlo School came up short in defending its 2022 title, falling 4-3 to Cupertino. The Pioneers won the first three matches before the Menlo No. 3 doubles team of Ben Levin and Kavan Kumar gave the Knights their first win, 6-3, 6-3. Evan Burnett and Cooper Han gave Menlo their other two wins, both posting three-set, tie-breaker wins at No. 1 and No. 2 singles, respectively.

The Knights’ season continues, however. By making the championship match, they qualified for the Northern California bracket beginning next week.

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The Carlmont boys’ volleyball team keeps winning. The Scots had a quick turnaround after winning the CCS Division I title last Saturday, they were back on the court Tuesday night in the Nor Cal Division IV bracket.

The top-seeded Scots (36-6) made easy work of No. 8 Nevada Union-Grass Valley, sweeping past the Miners (30-7), 25-16, 25-20, 25-17.

The Carlmont offense was led by Sean Murphy, who finished with a team-high 16 kills. Setter Kevin Tomita guided the offense, finishing with 28 assists, with Simon Hua adding 13. Will Won was a standout defensively, digging up 26 balls.

Up next for the Scots in another home match at 6 p.m. Thursday against fifth-seeded De La Salle-Concord (26-13). The Spartans knocked off No. 4 Antelope in four sets, 25-19, 25-11, 19-25, 31-29.

The Nor Cal championship match is at 6 p.m. Saturday at the home of the highest seed.

Nathan Mollat can be reached by email: nathan@smdailyjournal.com or by phone: 344-5200 ext. 117. To report scores or tips, email sports@smdailyjournal.com.