BRADENTON — Sarasota Riverview swept the boys and girls team championships at King Middle School, but local teams did not go away empty-handed.
St. Petersburg’s boys and Seminole’s girls teams finished second overall to advance to next week’s regionals. And St. Petersburg’s No. 1 player, freshman Adam Ambrozy, won the singles title and automatically advances to the Class 4A state championship in Altamonte Springs on April 17-19.
Ambrozy eased to the final against Riverview’s Austin Cruz then won 6-1, 6-1.
“There were a lot of long points and I was fortunate enough to win most of them,” said Ambrozy, whose sister, Agatha, played for St. Petersburg last season. “He’s pretty tough; he hit the ball hard. But he couldn’t really hurt me. I got to most of the shots.”
St. Petersburg had three other players in the singles finals. At No. 2, Dylan Sleszynski lost to Michael Moore of Riverview 6-4, 6-4. At No. 3, Carl Gallauer lost to Riverview’s Austin Herschan 6-1, 7-6 (7-4), and at No. 4 Langdon Miller lost to Ross Quarles of Riverview 6-3, 6-1.
In No. 5 singles, Riverview’s Jordan Menke defeated Seminole’s Jason Katz 6-0, 6-0.
St. Petersburg, which was 14-1 in the regular season, also sent both doubles teams to the finals. Ambrozy and Sleszynski teamed up against Riverview’s Quarles and Cruz, falling 6-3, 6-2. At No. 2 doubles, Miller and Gallauer lost to Moore and Menke 6-0, 6-3.
In girls singles, Riverview swept all five matches but Seminole advanced its top three players to finals (No. 1, Cailynn Madsen, No. 2, Alexandra Jones, No. 3, Amanda Mitchell).
In No. 1 doubles, Riverview’s Weintraub and Schofield downed Seminole’s Jones and Madsen 6-1, 6-4. At No. 2, Rokop and Kough beat Haley Shimkonis and Mitchell 6-0, 6-1.
2A-10: Lakewood girls secure second with doubles victory
TAMPA — Which teams would advance from the District 2A-10 tournament was decided early. So Tuesday’s action at Hillsborough Community College was to settle if Jesuit and Academy of the Holy Names could pull off a sweep.
Jesuit did, although the runnerup Robinson boys made it challenging. Holy Names looked headed to its own perfect score, but in the final match Lakewood posted a win at No. 2 doubles to put some emphasis on its second-place result.
The nine-team district turned into a Jesuit-Robinson duel. Tuesday’s best match came at No. 1 singles, where Jordan Nasser prevailed over Robinson freshman Michael Marinskiy 7-6 (7-5), 6-2. Nasser won the tiebreaker with a gutsy drop shot.
“That was definitely one of those, ‘No, no, okay … well done’ shots,” Jesuit coach Joe Curtis said.
David Pagliarulo faced a test in the No. 2 final but topped William Oken 6-3, 6-3. Enzo Peltz pushed Jesuit’s Palmer Evans to a 6-3 first set before Evans rolled 6-0 in the second, and at No. 4 Robinson’s Jaehee Choo rallied from down 5-1 but lost 7-5, 6-0 to Max Azzarelli.
In a match that lasted an hour past everyone else was finished, K.C. Shelton and Alie Dangar defeated Holy Names duo Olivia Rivas and Grace Williams 7-5, 3-6, 6-3 to secure the Spartans’ second-place finish.
Lakewood was keenly aware the Jaguars hadn’t lost a match and was happy to change that.
“Definitely. And we’re looking forward to playing them again next week, hopefully,” Dangar said.
The Spartans defeated Holy Names during the regular season when the Jaguars were not at full strength. Lakewood mathematically clinched the runnerup spot with Tuesday morning’s wins in doubles semifinals.
Raven Adams, who injured her finger during a doubles semifinal, is expected to return for next week’s regionals.
A-9: Chargers boys move on
At Sarasota Out-of-Door, Bradenton St. Stephen’s won the boys team championship, but Shorecrest moves on to regionals as runnerup.
Peter Litsky won the No. 2 singles championship, and teammates Logan Elder and Jack Ledford were runnersup at Nos. 3 and 5 singles, respectively, to help the Chargers advance.
Litsky and his brother, Nick, advanced to the No. 1 doubles final but lost to St. Stephen’s.
In the No. 1 singles final, Admiral Farragut’s Miles Holvoet lost to St. Stephen’s Bernardo Sanson 3-6, 6-3, 6-2.
There were no local girls teams or individuals who advanced. Out-of-Door and St. Stephen’s were the top teams.
Correspondent Darek Sharp contributed to this report.
Photo credit: Bradenton Herald