Cape Central boys tennis team tames Oakville for first district team title since 2007

When Central junior Pablo Jaramillo finished his doubles win with teammate Sam Stahly on Wednesday, the pair noticed their teammates doing something strange.

"We were like, 'Why'd the other courts stop playing?'" Jaramillo said.

The rest of the Central tennis team started to walk off the courts because Jaramillo and Stahly just had clinched the Class 2 District 1 team championship over Oakville with their 6-2, 6-1 victory.

Jaramillo said he didn't realize that winning the match would mean clinching the title by a 5-2 margin in the best-of-nine format.

"It really doesn't matter to me," Jaramillo said. "It would've been the same."

Central's Jake Wright celebrates a point during his 3-6, 6-3, 4-1 singles win over Oakville's Ryan Woods during the Class 2 District 1 title match Wednesday at Central. (ADAM VOGLER)

More of the same meant another easy victory for Jaramillo, Central's No. 1 player.

After dropping just two games in his singles victory in Tuesday's semifinal, Jaramillo defeated Oakville No. 1 Alex Bergman 6-0, 6-0 on Wednesday.

"Just being consistent and remembering to bend my knees," Jaramillo said about what he did well in district play. "Just stay focused on the match and don't start looking at other matches or the people who are watching my match because that just gets me out of my focus and I start losing points like that."

He would have seen many of his teammates falling behind if he'd looked around at other matches early.

"We started off really flat, unfortunately," Central coach Bud Craven said. "I was very worried."

Central's Pablo Jaramillo serves during his No. 1 doubles match Wednesday.

Central No. 3 Alvaro Jaramillo dropped his match 6-1, 6-1 while most of his teammates still were on court, and No. 4 Jake Wright and No. 5 Austin Shupert both lost the opening set of their matches before rallying to wins.

"Austin and Jake both had a hard match," Craven said. "They lost the first set and had to fight their way back, so that says a lot for them."

Craven said the team's experience helped it recover from the slow start.

"Most of them are seniors," Craven said. "So even though they started off really flat, they began to collect themselves and get it back together."

Stahly, a senior and Central's No. 2, defeated Oakville's Mark Dulle 6-3, 6-4 in their singles match.

Central's Ryan Watts serves during his No. 6 singles match Wednesday.

The victory was a reversal of the pair's regular-season result, when Dulle beat Stahly 6-1, 6-4.

"I lost my patience last game, got really angry at myself and couldn't really think about the shots I wanted to hit," Stahly said. "Today I just kind of focused on staying calm and not getting angry and stuff like that. That definitely helped out."

Stahly also entered the district match with a tactical plan for defeating Dulle.

"Hit it to his backhand and then come up to the net for a volley because I knew his backhand wasn't too strong," Stahly said. "So I went for his backhand and then would come up to get set up for a volley and try to put it away. That's what won the games for me."

Stahly held to go up 5-4 in the second set before executing his plan well to break Dulle in the next game and seal his victory.

"We jumped up point by point," Stahly said about the final game. "I won the first point, then he won the next one, then I won the next one. It finally got to 40-30 me, and I hit a winner into the corner on his backhand that he couldn't get to."

The team championship was Central's first since 2007.

"It's good for the other players to enjoy the victory as well," Pablo Jaramillo said. "I've had the victory with Sam before, but as a team we've never won it. So that's really nice that the whole team is a part of it."

Central advanced to the sectional round, which includes four teams, May 19. The sectional winner advances to the state tournament. Some members of the team will participate in individual and doubles district competition Saturday.

"We were second last year, so I was hopeful that this team this year would be a little bit better, and it was," Craven said about last season's team finish. "So it was good."

Singles

No. 1 -- Pablo Jaramillo (C) def. Alex Bergman 6-0, 6-0

No. 2 -- Sam Stahly (C) def. Mark Dulle 6-3,6-4

No. 3 -- Messy Dedic (O) def. Alvaro Jaramillo 6-1, 6-1

No. 4 -- Jake Wright (C) def. Ryan Woods 3-6, 6-3, 4-1 (ret.)

No. 5 -- Austin Shupert (C) def. Adam Pleimann 2-6, 6-2, 6-2

No. 6 -- Jack Romine (O) def. Ryan Watts 6-4, 6-2

Doubles

No. 1 -- P. Jaramillo/Stahly (C) def. Dulle/Dedic 6-2, 6-1