Doral girls’ tennis repeats as state champs, giving Miami-Dade five team winners

One more state tennis title is making its way back to Miami-Dade County.

The Doral girls’ tennis team repeated as the Class 3A state champion with a 4-1 win over Gulf Coast on Thursday, meaning Miami-Dade schools are responsible for five of the eight FHSAA team titles. The finals took place barely an hour after Doral beat West Boca in the semifinals and dealt with a slew of rain delays throughout the day.

Doral and Gulf Coast split the two doubles points, with the Firebirds tandem of Bin Zheng and Brenda Yoris winning 8-3 on Court 2 but Valeria Ray and Adriana Lamothe falling 8-5 on Court 1.

The Firebirds quickly won the three needed singles points to seal the title, with Zheng and Lamothe putting up perfect 6-0, 6-0 marks on Courts 2 and 3 before Yoris clinched it on Court 4 with a 6-2, 6-2 victory.

The Doral boys, meanwhile, finished as Class 3A state runners-up for the second consecutive year with a 4-2 loss to Venice in the state championship on Thursday.

The Ransom Everglades boys lost 5-0 to Boca Raton’s St. Andrew’s 5-0 in the Class 1A semifinals. The Carrollton girls also lost to St. Andrew’s in their semifinal.

The Doral girls team title come two days after Miami-Dade schools swept the first four team titles.

The Palmetto boys won their second consecutive Class 4A team title with a 4-0 win over Lake Nona to conclude an undefeated season. Palmetto’s four seniors — Randy Wilson, Matthew Fung, Ryan Fung and Daniel Martens — secured all four points the Panthers needed to win.

The Krop girls won their second Class 4A team title in three years with a 4-0 win over Lake Nona. It’s the school’s eighth overall team girls’ tennis title — all since 2007. The Lightning quickly went up 2-0 after sweeping doubles action. Camila Ordonez and Juliana Martinez took a 6-1, 6-4 decision on the No. 1 court, while sisters Valeria and Vanessa Centeno won 6-1, 6-3 on Court 2. Martinez and Vanessa Centeno took care of business in singles, each winning in straight sets and losing a combined three games to clinch the title.

Gulliver Prep, meanwhile, swept the Class 2A team titles, with the boys sweeping Tampa Jesuit 4-0 and the girls defeating Jacksonville Bolles 4-1.

The doubles tandem of Alvaro Gonzalez Rico and Yannik Rahman put the Gulliver boys on the board first with a 6-1, 6-0 win on Court 2, while Nikita Kolesnikov and Nicholas Gore battled to a three-set win (6-7, 6-3, 10-7) to bring the lead to 2-0. Gore and Eric Brook then sealed the championship with perfect 6-0, 6-0 showings in singles on Courts 2 and 5, respectively.

For the Gulliver girls, the doubles tandems of Sophia Fornaris (6-2, 6-0) and Sofia Restrepo and Katerina Navarro (6-1, 0-6, 10-8) gave the Raiders a 2-0 lead. Von Gerlach then put on a perfect showing in singles with a 6-0, 6-0 win on Court 2 and, after Navarro dropped her singles match on Court 4, Fornaris clinched the championship with a 6-2, 6-0 win on Court 1.

Individual titles

▪ Class 4A girls’ doubles: Ferguson’s Annie Carrera and Jordana Ossa defeated Krop’s Martinez and Ordonez 6-3, 6-4.

▪ Class 4A boys’ doubles: Palmetto’s Matthew Fung and Wilson defeated Riverview’s Brian Garcia and Charles Putrino.

▪ Class 4A boys’ singles: Cypress Bay’s Luis Iriarte Bastidas lost to Bucholz’s Ben Shelton 6-2, 6-3.

▪ Class 2A girls’ singles: Plantation American Heritage’s Natalie Block defeated Tampa Jesuit’s Caitlin Neal 6-1, 6-0.

▪ Class 2A girls’ doubles: Block and Katelyn Gramanzini defeated Rutherford’s Isabel Ceydeli and Ariane Cortes 6-2, 6-3.

▪ Class 2A boys’ doubles: Pine Crest’s David Lins and Andrew Pereverzev defeated Bolles’ Louis Ballantyne and Adam Lynch 6-2, 6-3.

▪ Class 2A boys’ singles: Lins defeated Boca Raton’s Evan Dean 6-1, 6-1.

▪ Class 3A and 1A overall singles and doubles finals take place on Friday.