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Laguna Blanca Summer Tennis Camp 2016 Wrap-Up

Tennis Camp 2016 2-19 Today, we completed the third edition of the Laguna Blanca Tennis Camp in beautiful Santa Barbara and I’m proud to report a successful week. With 14 awesome campers, 5 celebrity players, 3 legendary coaches + yours truly, how could we go wrong?

In the team competition, Team Panda narrowly survived a late charge by Team Phix, giving Coach Tristan his team’s first win at Laguna Tennis Camp! Individual awards were handed out to Henry Signa (Most Improved), Alessa Somer (Coaches’ Award), and Grace Fuss/Luke Williams (Co-MVP’s).

Over the last five days we’ve prepared campers to make the jump from junior tennis to the high school format and learned some other important lessons, too: Continue reading “Laguna Blanca Summer Tennis Camp 2016 Wrap-Up”

Summer Tennis Camp 2016 off to Great Start!

Warmup Two days are done and dusted and I think we can all agree that today’s drop in temperature was a welcome respite (relatively, at least). Yesterday’s session featured an emphasis on the ins and outs of tie-breakers and the outsize role they can play in determining a match.

We also split into teams that will be competing for “Owl Points” throughout the remainder of camp. Coach Tristan’s team selected “Team Panda” while Coach Phillip Hick’s players used bits of his name to form the name “Team Phix.” The first Owl Point was awarded to Team Phix for most creative name, but Team Panda responded immediately with a win in the team serving competition by the narrowest of margins. Continue reading “Summer Tennis Camp 2016 off to Great Start!”

Ranked Laguna Tennis Team Misses Playoffs Selection on Technicality

It is with sadness that I have to report this news. Laguna Blanca Boys’ Tennis will not be in CIF Playoffs for a fourth consecutive season, despite showing superior performance over other teams that will be included.

As a freelance team, CIF requires 50% win-percentage to apply for an “at-large” bid and 80% win-percentage for automatic qualification into the playoffs. At 12-4, we came up one win short of 80%. Having had a great season, I still felt we had a good chance at being selected, but it was not to be. Continue reading “Ranked Laguna Tennis Team Misses Playoffs Selection on Technicality”

Laguna Tennis Finishes Regular Season 12-4

Laguna completed regular season play with a 15-3 win over Dunn that was initially quite a close match! In the first round, Dunn senior Abe Storey took an early 4-1 lead against Laguna’s Alex Furukawa and managed to hold on for a 6-4 victory. Meanwhile, on the next court over, Dunn’s best player (Julian Deck) picked up a tie-break win against Laguna senior Phillip Hicks and the #3 doubles position was also won by Dunn in a close set. Happily, that was to be the end of Dunn’s scoring for the day.

After going 3-3 overall in the first round, Laguna picked up the remaining 12 sets of play, spearheaded by a sweeps from Andrew Tolles in singles and Jack Stein/Kovid Mishra in doubles. Victor Liu/Conor Scheinberg also won two sets by large margins before Cameron Squire replaced Scheinberg to win a third-round set with Victor Liu.

The win puts Laguna Blanca Tennis at 12-4 overall, just short of the 80% win-margin required to automatically qualify for CIF Playoffs. Laguna hopes that consistently appearing on the D4 Top-Ten Seeding List will aid an at-large bid into the playoffs. Draws will be announced next Monday.

Laguna Empties Bench in 13-5 Win

Conor Scheinberg

Laguna Blanca moved to 8-1 on the season with a 13-5 victory at home against Orcutt Academy (5-3). The matched featured all 18 members of the Laguna team.

Singles was anchored by Alex Furukawa, who won his sets 6-1, 6-1 before being substituted out in the final round. Sophomores Conor Scheinberg (pictured above) and Victor Liu also came away with two wins each in singles.

In doubles, Phillip Hicks won two sets with different partners before being substituted out. Hicks partnered with fellow team captain Atty Roddick for a resounding 6-0 victory against the #1’s and then teamed up with Cameron Squire for a 6-4 win against the #3’s.

Freshman Andrew Tolles added 2-of-3 sets playing with different partners in each round.

The Owls are on spring break for several weeks, returning to play on April 12th against Carpinteria High at home.

Laguna Blanca Finally Defeat Pirates in 10-8 Win

Phillip Hicks Three seasons ago, Laguna Blanca boys’ tennis made the CIF playoffs for the first time in a decade. That team would go on to win a tight first-round match and hold a 4-2 lead over regional rival Santa Ynez High in the Round of 16. When all was said and done, Santa Ynez came back from that deficit with a 10-8 victory. It was a heartbreaker.

The next year, Santa Ynez beat us 11-7 in regular season play and then went on to win the CIF Division 4 Championships. In that match, Tristan Prinz and Ben Furukawa swept their singles sets and Phillip Hicks added another win at the #3 spot, but doubles got blanked 0-9. It was a heartbreaker.

Last season, Santa Ynez came to play at Laguna but after a few minutes of rain, decided unilaterally to cancel the match. Laguna Blanca seemed primed to finally take the win and the courts were dry shortly after the scheduled start time. The match never got rescheduled. It was a heartbreaker.

This season, there was no heartbreak. Phillip Hicks and Alex Furukawa (Ben Furukawa’s younger brother) continued the trend of two years prior by sweeping at the #1 and #2 singles spots. Today, though, there was also enough firepower in doubles to overcome the Pirates. Continue reading “Laguna Blanca Finally Defeat Pirates in 10-8 Win”

Laguna Tennis Now 5-1, Entering Heart of the Season

Laguna bounced back from yesterday’s loss with a resounding 13-5 win over Nordhoff High School at their courts in Ojai. The Rangers are currently ranked #10 in CIF D5 and are the defending Frontier League Champions. Continue reading “Laguna Tennis Now 5-1, Entering Heart of the Season”

Laguna Boys’ Win First Match of the Season

laguna beats coast union

During what can only be described as an idyllic day for tennis, the Laguna Blanca boys’ team got it’s season off to a solid start with a 13-5 win today against Coast Union.

Laguna dominated singles play, winning 8-of-9 sets. Senior Phillip Hicks and sophomore Alex Furukawa both swept, while freshman Andrew Tolles added two wins.

Tolles and Furukawa are fresh off the soccer team’s 2nd round loss in CIF playoffs yesterday, meaning they didn’t even get to practice before the match! Now that they’ll be on-court every day together, these three will be an increasingly dangerous starting singles lineup as the season progresses.

In doubles, sophomore Jason Barnick had an outstanding day, winning his first two sets with partner Kylan Tyng and adding a third set win with partner Kelvin Chen. Barnick dropped just 1 game in three sets of play.

Senior Atty Roddick and sophomore Victor Liu came up with 6-1, 6-0 wins along with a close 4-6 set against the Coast Union #1 doubles team. Jack Stein and Eric Chen also had their talons out in their first matches together, coming close to victory in three 4-6 sets.

Laguna boys’ tennis plays next on March 1st at home against St. Bonaventure High School at 3pm. We hope to see you out there!

Thorpe Tennis: 2015 Year in Review

Barbara Hallquist DeGroot Celebrity Coach Laguna Blanca Summer Tennis Camp Another great year is in the books and I am thrilled by the progress my students have made in 2015. I’m already excitedly looking forward to raising the bar again in 2016, but before we get ahead of ourselves…

A few highlights from the year at Thorpe Tennis:

Worked with 63 different players from age 8 to 52.
Spent over 1,000 hours on-court teaching lessons and coaching high school matches.
Directed a second successful year of the Laguna Blanca Summer Tennis Camp, oriented towards middle schoolers and incoming freshmen interested in playing at the high school level.
Coached Laguna Blanca Boys’ Tennis to an 13-3 regular-season record and won a CIF playoff round for the third consecutive year.
Led Cate School Girls’ Tennis to what was likely the most successful season in team history, going 13-1 during the regular season and making the CIF D2 Quarterfinals.
Coached an unheard-of six Cate girls to Tri-Valley League All-League 1st Team and received Coach of the Year Award.
Completed a two-year project with Edward Cho at Cate, helping him achieve his goal of going from JV to Varsity singles starter
Began utilizing photos and slow-motion video within lessons to give players another angle for understanding their game.
Helped Julia Gan finally break the top-400 in the country, while also winning the Tri-Valley League Singles Championship and getting widely recruited to play college tennis. We even made her an awesome recruiting video!
Had the pleasure of watching senior students matriculate to fine schools such as: Cal Poly SLO, St. Andrews, Carnegie Mellon, NYU, and University of Colorado at Boulder.
Expanded community interaction with my students, their families, and other supporters with 28 blog posts that were visited by 1,800 people and viewed 5,000 times. This year also featured many photos of players in action that are free to download and share!

Thanks to all of you for being part of my tennis family. It is my passion and pleasure to be part of yours. Here’s to another great year of tennis in Santa Barbara!

Trevor Thorpe

Cate CIF Run Halted by Strong Murrieta Valley Squad

Cate School faced Murrieta Valley yesterday in the CIF D2 Quarterfinal Round and, sadly, we came out on the losing end (4-14).

Murrieta Valley had too much firepower in singles, sweeping all nine sets. In the first round, it looked that Julia Gan was going to work her magic one more time, going up 3-0 against Jovana Kuljanin, who is ranked #148 in the country and will be playing D1 tennis under scholarship next season. In the end, Gan fell 5-7 in a very close set. From there, it was all Murrieta Valley in singles.

Doubles play was much more even, with Cate’s talented #1 team Summer Christensen/McKenna Madden taking two-of-three. Eva Herman and Janice Ng continued their strong post-season play, winning two sets as well.

In the end, we just came up against a stronger team. There’s nothing more we could have done. My girls made me very proud today, not just in the way they battled, but also in the way they carried themselves. The Murrieta Valley coach remarked to me that our team was the nicest and most sportsmanlike opponent they had faced all season. I can think of no better way to face this defeat.

For Julia Gan, Jackie Cai, and the doubles team of Christensen and Madden, the season isn’t quite over yet, with CIF individuals still ahead at the Cate School on Monday, November 23rd.

For those of you who are interested in the quality of opponent we faced in this match (besides the fact that their school is 12-times the size of ours), here are the top 5 players from Murrieta Valley, who combined to win all 12 sets they played: Jovana Kuljanin, Alana Andrews, Faith Pearson, Kelsey Lajom, Ashley Nishimoto