WACO – Frisco Centennial’s march toward a team tennis state championship three-peat continued Wednesday as the Titans beat Abilene Wylie 11-3 in a UIL Class 5A team tennis state semifinal at Baylor’s Hurd Tennis Center.
After a closely contested doubles session, Centennial’s singles prowess took center stage as they won six straight matches to clinch a spot in the state final. In the process, Centennial (15-5) matched its winning margin from the state final a year ago, when they beat Wylie 10-2.
The closest match of the opening session came in the mixed doubles. Centennial’s Rohan Singh and Ananya Kala lost a marathon match 7-6 (8-6), 3-6, 1-0 (15-13) against Wylie’s James McCall and Lili Owens, which put the Bulldogs within one match (4-3) of the Titans heading into the singles.
“I thought there might be a potential momentum shift, but I said this isn’t basketball. This is tennis. Go out there and take care of your business, and I thought we did a really good job,” Centennial head coach Douglas Fair said. “We’ve been very resilient all year and played really good singles all year too, so I felt good about it.”
Centennial’s Rohan Sheth impressed on the boys second line, winning 6-2, 6-0 to kick off his team’s winning streak in the singles. Partnered with Aarohan Sharma, Sheth also won his second line doubles match 6-3, 6-0. On the girls side, the doubles partnership of Sahasra Dodda and Siri Aravalli delivered, winning their match together 6-2, 6-3 and then each picking up a match win in singles.
Centennial will face undefeated Corpus Christi Flour Bluff in the Class 5A State Championship Thursday at 11:30 a.m. back at the Hurd Tennis Center.
Fair chose to focus on his own team when looking ahead at the final.
“I’m really going to make it about us, and I know that if we play hard like we have all year and play well like we have in the playoffs, I think we can get some really good results out of that match,” Fair said. “It’s about us.”
Coppell’s team tennis magic runs out
Coppell (19-7) lost 10-5 against Round Rock Westwood (21-0) in a Class 6A state semifinal at the Waco Regional Tennis Center.
The loss closes out a season where Coppell made it to the state tournament for the first time in school history after an upset victory over then-undefeated Southlake Carroll in the regional final. Westwood, a three-time defending state champion, proved too much for the Cowboys on Wednesday.
“We competed pretty well today,” Coppell head coach Alyssa Noonan said. “It just didn’t go our way, but I couldn’t be more proud of how our kids fought and competed in every match, no matter if they were outmatched on paper or not. We were out there fighting and that’s all that a coach can ask.”
Noonan pointed to the final match of the doubles session, a third line contest between Coppell’s Varsha Sivaprasad and Rhea Guru and Westwood’s Rachana Akkineni and Leah Kardonik as a turning point. Down 4-2 at the time, a win would have put the Cowboys in striking distance as they headed to the singles session. Instead, Westwood’s duo fought back from a set down to force a deciding super tiebreak which they won 10-8 to give the Warriors a 5-2 cushion going into singles.
Coppell’s first line singles players Alexandra Patton and Kasi Kivali both picked up two points, winning both their singles and doubles matches. Patton, a 2025 state runner-up in singles, was especially dominant, winning her singles match 6-1, 6-1 and her doubles match 6-0, 6-1 while paired with Gabrielle Rice.
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