Sewickley Academy eyes doubles gold
Tri-State Sports & News Service
Ryan Gex has been in this position before. Three other times. Gex, a Sewickley Academy senior, is the first player in history to win four consecutive WPIAL doubles titles. As such, he and his latest partner, senior Neil Rana, will head into the PIAA Class 2A tournament at Hershey Racquet Club with the goal of bringing home the Panthers first state title in the event.
And, like the past three years, he is coming off the state team playoffs where Sewickley Academy has won the past two PIAA championships.
“I think there’s a little advantage because the courts there are similar to [The Club Sport and Health] in Monroeville where we played WPIALs,” Gex said. “The courts are a little faster and the atmosphere is exciting because you have players from so many different schools that bring their whole families.”
This year, though, Gex and Rana, who teamed with Brian Rosario last year and made it into the quarterfinals, are hoping for a much different result.
Since the PIAA split tennis into two classifications in 1999, no WPIAL doubles team has ever won a state championship. In fact, no doubles team has ever even made it into the finals.
Gex has been close twice. As a freshman, he and partner Luke Vith made it to the semifinals where they lost a three-set heartbreaker to Pete Kazmierczak and Tony Kutz of Scranton Prep. Last year, Gex and older brother Don once again lost to the same duo, like in 2014, after winning the first set.
Kazmierczak and Kutz have graduated, but that doesn’t mean it will be any easier for Gex and Rana to push through to the finals. They open the tournament at 10:30 a.m. Friday with a meeting against District 3 third-place finishers Justin Schuertz and Orio Aragay of Berks Catholic
“For our team, our No. 1 and No. 2 singles guys usually qualify and a lot of the doubles teams, they use their one-two singles guys as a doubles team,” Gex said. “Playing against a one-two singles team is difficult to adapt to in a match because some of these WPIAL teams, their 1-2 singles aren’t as strong as they are in the east.”
California’s pair of Josh Monroe and Josh Wohar, the WPIAL runners-up, have also been to the state finals before. The two played last year and dropped a 7-5, 46, 6-3 first-round decision to Tim Sprunt and Tyler Spinello of District 4 Lewisburg.
This time around, Monroe and Wohar will take on District 12 champions Anthony Chaiditya and Kailash Natarajan of Masterman in the first round. Chaiditya also made it into the tournament last year where he and his partner lost in the first round.
Sewickley Academy’s other tandem, WPIAL thirdplace finishers Arjan Bedi and Nishant Purewall, will face District 2 representatives Eamon Gibbons and Andrew Schukraft, the No. 1 and No. 2 singles players from Wyoming Seminary.
Class 3A
Upper St. Clair senior Liam Gibbons and junior Kevin Kwok fought tooth and nail to go from the No. 2 seed in the WPIAL Class 3A tournament to win the title and earn their spot in the state finals.
They had a notoriously tough, 11-9, quarterfinal proset match with North Allegheny’s Ivan Voinov and two-time state finalist and 2015 champion Richard Hofmann, took three sets to win their semifinal tilt with Ben Vinarski and Sid Iyer of Pine-Richland and won a tough match in the finals, 7-6 (7-2), 6-4 to take the crown.
Things won’t get any easier now.
When the two open the tournament at 1:30 p.m. Friday, they will take on District 1 third-place finishers Bryan Szyana and Danny Katz of Upper Dublin. It will be the first time the Upper St. Clair pair have played in the state finals.
Hampton also has two first-timers in freshman Ben Ringeisen and junior Ted Donegan. The WPIAL second-place tandem will take on District 12 champions John Ruan and Anthony Goncharenko of Central.
A team from the WPIAL has been to the PIAA Class 3A finals each of the past four years and has won two titles.
City League champions Krishnan Alagar and Sachin Thiagarjan also qualified and will face District 2 champions Brian Ostrowski and Timmy Christman of Abington Heights in the first round.