It wasn’t enough for Jamesville-DeWitt boys tennis player Peter Hatton and the Christian Brothers Academy duo of Ben and Dean Vlassis just to get to the New York State Public High School Athletic Association tournament.
The real goal for all of them was to make their way to the USTA-Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Queens, annual site of the U.S. Open, and push for the big prize – which they did, both making it all the way to the last two rounds and, ultimately, to third-place finishes.
Awarded the no. 4 seed in doubles, the Vlassis brothers were dominant in last Thursday’s opening-round matches, starting with a 6-2, 6-0 sweep of Brighton’s Rahul Ravi and Thomas Xue in the first round.
Then, when Ben and Dean shut out Olean’s Filip Morawski and Thomas Bates 6-0, 6-0, it made it to Friday morning’s quarterfinal, where they faced Niskayuna’s Ricky Dartawan and Jarod Rackliffe and, again, won with ease, prevailing 6-0, 6-3.
Now came the semifinal match, the Vlassis brothers against Mamaroneck’s Charlie Levinson and Connor Aylett, the no. 2 seed and defending state champions who had beaten the Fayetteville-Manlius duo of Rohan Dhawan and Riley Ma two rounds earlier.
Ben and Dean could not do much in the first set and, though they improved in the second set, they lost, 6-1, 6-4, to Levinson and Aylett, who went on to face top seed Nikolay Sahakyan and Jason Shuler (Scarsdale) in the finals.
Still, third place was attainable as, on Saturday, the Vlassis brothers faced Mikey Weitz and Adrian Tsui, from Roslyn, who in the round of 16 had beaten J-D’s duo of Essex Glowaki and Dhruv Nanavati.
Ben and Dean put up one more superb effort, defeating Weitz and Tsui 6-1, 6-1 to capture that third-place spot as Sahaykan and Shuler defeated Levinson and Aylett 6-3, 6-7, 6-4 to capture the state title.
Hatton was the no. 7 seed in singles, and like the Vlassis brothers breezed through Thursday’s matches. He handled Albany CBA’s Mike Kendrick 6-0, 6-1 before a round-of-16 match where he roared past Newburgh Free Academy’s Troy Steiner 6-1, 6-0.
Now, in Friday’s quarterfinals, it was Hatton against the no. 3 seed, Bronxville’s Liam Krall. And Hatton stayed in top form, taking just two sets to eliminate Krall 6-4, 6-2 and reach the semifinals.
Neither Hatton nor his semifinal opponent, no. 2 seed Kabir Rajpal from Syosset, had lost a set in the tournament, and Rajpal would keep that record, humbling Hatton 6-3 in the first set and taking the second set 7-6 after a 7-2 tie-breaker.
A day later, playing for third place against Keio Academy’s Ryo Sakai, Hatton won 6-4, 6-2 to complete his remarkable season, while Rajpal lost a 6-0, 3-6, 6-2 battle to Geneva’s Ryan Fishback for the state championship.
Glowaki and Nanavati went 1-1 in the state touranment as they won, 6-3, 6-4, over Newburgh’s Aarav and Arnav Shah in the first round before a 6-2, 6-2 defeat to Weitz and Tsui.
Dhawan and Ma also won in the first round, handling Ithaca’s Dennis Kang and Quinn Tonole 6-0, 6-2, only to run into Levinson and Aylett in the round of 16 and falling to them 6-1, 6-4.
West Genesee’s Matt Mannara and James Plunkett also advanced to the state tournament and also won in the first round before Horace Greeley’s Kenta Togo and Zach Wallis beat them 6-0, 7-5.
Meanwhile, Hatton was joined in singles by Mexico’s Joe Ocker and Baldwinsville’s Antonio Marsallo, each of whom lost in the first round.
