Menlo School adds doubles crown to its Central Coast Section team tennis title

But all that mixing and matching was back at the forefront during the CCS individual singles and doubles tournaments at Imperial Courts in Aptos Tuesday and Wednesday, where the Knights finished second in singles and won the doubles title.

“It became pretty clear our top two guys (Evan Burnett and Cooper Han) were our top two guys,” said longtime Menlo head coach Bill Shine. “After that, I have about eight guys who are all the same. It gives me the luxury to move guys around. It keeps everyone happy. It makes it better for everybody.

“It’s one of deepest teams I’ve had. One through 10 is pretty impressive. … I would put this team up against any team I’ve had.”

In the doubles bracket, Menlo had two of the top four seeds and three tandems total, all six of whom show off the versatile nature of this year’s Menlo squad.

Soren Sutaria and Mick Tamas are the No. 2 seed which advanced to the semifinals. Sutaria started the season in doubles play before moving into the singles spot. Tamas wasn’t even in the lineup early on before settling in at singles the second half of the year.

“I mixed [Tamas] around a little bit,” Shine said. “We were so deep that I didn’t have to play my top 10 guys the whole time.”

Burnett, whose shoulder injury kept him out of the No. 1 singles spot early in the season, teamed with Rohan Shah to form the fourth-seeded team in CCS. They won their first two matches in straight sets before upsetting the top seed of Partha Hathalia and Shaima Srikantan of Cupertino in the semifinals, 7-6, 6-4.

Burnett played his early-season matches at No. 1 doubles until his shoulder was good enough to handle the rigors of singles play and when he was ready, he took off.

“He’s our best player,” Shine said.

But it was Menlo’s unseeded team of Alex Volgin and Rishi Jain who knocked off Sutaria and Tamas to make it an all-Menlo final.

Volgin and Jain beat their teammates in the semifinals, 7-5, 5-7, 7-5.

In the championship match, Burnett and Rohan won the first set over Volgin and Rishi, 6-2 and were leading 2-1 in the second when Volgin and Rishi were forced to retire due to injury.

Han, only a freshman who bounced between No. 1 and No. 2 singles for much of the season, garnered the No. 1 seed in the CCS singles tournament, losing only three games in straight-set wins in the first round and quarterfinals Tuesday. Han finally found some competition on Day 2 of the tournament, needing three sets to win his semifinal match over Aptos’ Koosha Safari, who made the tournament as an alternate. Han won the first set 6-2, dropped the second 4-6, but won the third set going away, 6-1.

In the singles championship match, Han faced second-seeded Tommy Kim of Cupertino, with Kim posting a 6-4, 7-5 win.

To even have this many Menlo players in the CCS individual tournament is a rare occurrence. Shine’s focus on team success and the academic rigors at Menlo usually means most of the Knights’ top players sit out the singles and doubles tournaments. There must have been a collective groan from the rest of the field when they saw a number of Menlo players entered in the tournament.

“That’s exactly what happened,” Shine said of the reaction to his players in the field. “Usually, these kids are ready for school to be over. But we have so many seniors and they wanted to play with one another.”

Shine said this year’s senior class won CCS and Northern California team titles as freshmen and, if not for COVID, Shine believed this class was on pace to win three, maybe even four, CCS titles. After having both their sophomore and junior seasons impacted by the pandemic, Shine is not really surprised to see them want to extend their season.

“It was nice to see everyone (still wanting to play the individual tournaments),” Shine said.

And the Knights still aren’t done. They open Nor Cal regional play against Pleasant Valley-Chico at 10 a.m. Friday at Broadstone Racquet Club in Folsom, with the winner advancing to a Friday afternoon semifinal match. The final is scheduled for 1 p.m. Saturday.