Three members of Redwood’s Tennis team talk about their season so far, including the Visalia Invitational and other matches.
By: Benjamin Newell
Recently our Redwood Boys Varsity Tennis team played in the Visalia Invitational and ended up placing 3rd in the first day of the tournament on Saturday, March 15th, scoring 44 points from a tally of all the individual singles and doubles results.
Our Junior Varisty (JV) boys tennis team also shared how their season is going overall. Jessie Xiong, ’27, and Elijah Jung, ’27, talk more about their season and how they have improved more as a team.
Our Redwood team ended up placing 3rd in the tournament, closely behind Sanger and Buchanan, who had 60 points and 94 points respectively.
Isaiah Largoza, ’25, shares how he prepared for the invitational saying, “I got good rest and I also drank a lot of electrolytes and carbohydrates.”
Largoza talks about the goals that he had for the tournament, as well as which ones he managed to accomplish during the invitational. “Just placing in the tournament, I got that goal. And playing through the entire day.”
When asked what teams posed a big threat, Largoza says, “Definitely Buchanan. Buchanan [had] probably the top player. Their team was always good, and they played really well.” Buchanan ended up taking the overall victory in that first part of the tournament.
Largoza says, “[Overall] we are doing really good we beat Monache and Porterville, and they are supposed to be our hardest matches.” “Wesley and I played doubles, and at the beginning, we weren’t doing that well but we brought it together and we started winning.”
Redwood is currenlty 4-0 in the East Yosemite League so far, with 9-0 wins over Monache, Porterville, Golden West, and El Diamante.
This is Xiong’s first season playing tennis for the JV team. Xiong talks about how the JV season is going.
Photo B.Newell/Gigantea
Xiong says, “It’s going pretty good. We won a few of our matches, most of them I’d say. It’s my first year playing tennis and I think I’ve improved majorly since when I started. I’ve won a lot of matches, I’ve lost some too. And I think I find more value in losing than winning because than I can just improve from my mistakes.”
Xiong talks about his favorite memory on the team, saying, “My favorite memory with the tennis team was probably us getting lunch together after every away game. Because we get to talk, we sit there for almost an hour and we just go out, eat, and talk.”
Elijah Jung, ’28, is also playing JV tennis for Redwood for the first time. Jung says, “The tennis season so far is going well, but we have more work to do. I have improved a lot over the course of this season. I picked up tennis last December and didn’t know the proper form, but now I have a decent game.”
Jung talks about his favorite memory and elaborates more on the team chemistry, saying, “I think my favorite memory was going to my first tournament. We got to play two teams, and it was a new and fun experience for me. Everyone has a good relationship with one another and I’ve gotten to know a lot more people because of tennis.”
Ben Newell
Ben Newell loves writing and telling stories. Ben is creative and loves listening to the world around him. Newell is currently writing for the sports section
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