The West Valley tennis team battled injuries and a tough City College of San Francisco side to take a key 6-3 Coast Conference win at CCSF Friday afternoon.
Tal Volinsky, a last minute substition in WVC's doubles-one line, teamed with Allison Bartlett for a stunning 8-6 win over Ariel Xu and Alanna Hale. Bartlett and Volinsky found themselves down 6-4 and rallied to take four straight games and give WVC a 1-0 lead in the match.
All three WVC doubles teams were on the short end of the score midway through their matches. WVC's D2 pair, Brynn McKenzie and Sonya Hu, trailed Gina Tsiu and Lily Tan, and battled back to send it to a tiebreaker and an eventual 9-8 (8) win. Viking D3's Abigail Prokter and Lavanika Sharma both fought through injuries to also tie things up, before dropping a 9-8 match to Christina Ling and Bernice Zhu.
Lindsay Lee gave the Vikings (9-1, 8-0 Coast) a 3-1 lead with a 6-1, 6-0 singles-three win over Alanna Hale. CCSF climbed to within 3-2 when Prokter had to retire in her S1 match against Xu, but Bartlett prevailed 6-1, 6-2 over Ling to capture S2 and give WVC a 4-2 advantage. The Rams (3-2, 1-2) stayed within striking distance when an injury forced WVC's Brynn McKenzie to retire in her S5 match with Anh Duong.
Sharma exemplified the Viking grit on the day in her S6 match with Rosanna Chiu. Battling a lower leg injury, Sharma dropped set one 6-1 and then somehow put together a pair of improbable 6-4 wins to take the match and clinch the win for West Valley. Sonya Hu made it 6-3 with a 6-3, 6-2 S4 win over Tan.
WVC has a full week ahead with home matches against Diablo Valley (0-6, 0-5 Big 8) Tuesday (3/21), Monterey Peninsula (2-4, 1-3) Thursday (3/23) and Ohlone (0-5, 0-5) Friday (3/24). All three matches start at 2:00pm.
Complete WVC/CCSF scores:
D1: Allison Bartlett/Tal Volinsky (WVC) defeat Ariel Xu/Alanna Hale (CCSF) 8-6
D2: Brynn McKenzie/Sonya Hu (WVC) defeat Gina Tsiu/Lily Tan (CCSF) 9-8 (8)
D3: Christina Ling/Bernice Zhu (CCSF) defeat Abigail Prokter/Lavanika Sharma (WVC) 9-7
Order of finish: 1, 3, 2
S1: Ariel XU (CCSF) defeats Abigail Proker (WVC) 6-2, 1-1 (injury default)
S2: Allison Bartlett (WVC) defeats Christina Ling (CCSF) 6-1, 6-2
S3: Lindsay Lee (WVC) defeats Alanna Hale (CCSF) 6-1, 6-0
S4: Sonya Hu (WVC) defeats Lily Tan (CCSF) 6-3, 6-2
S5: Anh Duong (CCSF) defeats Brynn McKenzie (WVC) 6-4, 4-0 (injury default)
S6: Lavanika Sharma (WVC) defeats Rosanna Chiu (CCSF) 1-6, 6-4, 6-4
Order of finish: 3, 1, 2, 5, 6, 4
