Warriors win first two league tennis matches

Fallbrook High School's tennis team traveled to San Pasqual High School to begin Valley League play April 6 and returned with a 13-4 victory.

The Warriors improved to 2-0 in Valley League competition and 5-3 overall April 8 with an 11-6 win over Valley Center on the Adams Community Park courts in Valley Center.

"I'm pretty happy about it. It's taken at least this long for us to come together," said Fallbrook coach Bill Lenaway.

The coronavirus shutdown delayed the start of CIF sports until February. Girls tennis is normally a fall sport and boys tennis is normally a spring sport. Boys and girls tennis were combined for the 2020-21 season including mixed doubles sets for the first time in San Diego Section history.

"The boys and girls are starting to communicate with each other," Lenaway said. "I'm pleased with the progress so far."

This season's format consists of three boys singles sets, three girls singles sets, three boys doubles sets, three girls doubles sets, and five mixed doubles sets. In a normal boys or girls season, three singles players from each school play sets against each of the other school's singles players while three doubles tandems from each team face each of their doubles counterparts.

For 2020-21, a boy or girl is limited to two sets in a match. "I feel bad for some of our kids because they don't get to play as much as they used to," Lenaway said.

Fallbrook's boys singles players and boys doubles players swept their San Pasqual counterparts. "Our boys are playing pretty well and are winning a lot of sets," Lenaway said.

The singles sets at San Pasqual consisted of a 6-0 triumph by junior Nolan Sim, a 6-1 victory by junior Nash Youngren, and a 6-2 win by senior Ethan Lenaway. In boys doubles, Sim and junior Daniel Winton won a 6-0 set; junior Julian Cardenas and junior Angel Leon prevailed by a 6-1 score, and junior James Smith and sophomore Joseph Tygert obtained a 6-3 victory.

Two Fallbrook girls won singles sets. The set with junior Alexa Guadarrama was a 6-3 victory for her. If each player wins six games a tiebreaking game to seven points is played and a win must be by at least two points; freshman Angelica Palmerin was involved in such a 13th game and took an 8-6 victory in the tiebreaker.

Although senior Vronie Serrano lost a 7-6 singles set, Serrano and junior Carly Hawkins accounted for Fallbrook's only girls doubles victory at San Pasqual and won by a 6-0 margin.

Lenaway and Palmerin won a 6-2 mixed doubles match. Three of Fallbrook's mixed doubles wins at San Pasqual were by 6-3 scores with Youngren and sophomore Samantha Hanlon, Hawkins and Winton, and Tygert and sophomore Erin Rowan giving Fallbrook those team points. Although Leon and sophomore Cynthia Flor lost their mixed doubles set, the score was 7-5.

Sim and Youngren had 6-0 boys singles victories at Valley Center while Lenaway took a 6-1 win. Serrano won a 6-2 girls singles set while Palmerin's singles triumph was a 6-3 set. Flor and Rowan prevailed in a 6-0 girls doubles set while Guadarrama and Hanlon had a winning score of 6-3. Sim and Winton won by a 6-2 margin, Smith and Tygert defeated their opponents in a 6-3 set, and although Cardenas and Leon lost, it was by a 7-5 score. In mixed doubles Hanlon and Youngren were victorious in a 6-1 set, Lenaway and Palmerin had a 6-4 victory, and Hawkins and Smith also won a 6-4 set.

The Valley League for tennis this season consists of Fallbrook, Escondido, Ramona, San Pasqual, Valley Center, and Vista. Each team plays each other at home and on the opponent's court. "It's actually a reasonably competitive league," Bill Lenaway said.

League play is scheduled to conclude May 6. "We're hoping to get a league title and make something happen," Lenaway said.