Ryan Murken

Your Prep Sports

IOWA CITY – The two-day state tennis tournament is a sprint to the finish after a nearly two-month season.

For many players the opening day of the Class 2A state meet on Tuesday at the Hawkeye Tennis and Recreation Center turned into more of a marathon.

The West High doubles tandem of Shivy Mannengi and Samir Singh navigated a challenging opening day that featured three matches in seven hours and temperatures nearing 90 degrees winning a pair of matches to advance to the final day on Wednesday.

This was a really tough day, everyone had three matches with temperatures in the 90s and there were a lot of people cramping,” Singh said. “Eventually we pushed through and we all stayed together.”

Singh and Mannengi join West High senior Jayden Shin as area athletes to secure medals and advance into Wednesday.

Shin opened with a 6-1, 6-2 victory over Abhay Anil of City High before falling to second-seeded Kaden Taylor of Waukee Northwest in the second round.

In his third match of a long opening day Shin defeated Noah Gehler of Bettendorf 6-0, 6-1 and will play Jake Althaus (Dubuque Hempstead) in consolation semifinals on Wednesday at 9:30 a.m.

It was a similar story for Singh and Mannengi, one of two West High doubles tandems to advance to the state meet.

The duo opened with a 6-2, 4-6, 6-3 win over the West Des Moines Valley team of Vyas Amalkar and Seppe Frattiani.

After a 6-4, 6-3 loss to second-seeded Pleasant Valley team of Folu Adekunle and Aaron Ingram 6-4, 6-3 Singh and Mannengi didn’t have long to rest before a final match of the day.

“It was good we were able to bounce back,” Singh said. “We took some time to regroup with our coach and just calmed down a little mentally and went out and had a fresh start.”

The duo moved on to the final day of the tournament with a 6-1, 6-2 straight-set victory over the West Des Moines Dowling duo of Brady Frye and Jimmy Wanek 6-1, 6-2.

“It’s the state champions so every single player here is good, every single one of the matches are really high intensity and high level,” Singh said. “Playing three high-intensity, high-level matches is really difficult.”

Singh and Mannengi, who defeated teammates Patrick Selby and Junze Sun to win the district championship, will play the Bettendorf team of Robert Matera and Jack Reilly in the consolation semifinals on Wednesday at 10 a.m.

“A lot of it is physical, how good your leg muscles are,” Shivy Mannengi said. “Tournaments like these you have to handle it physically and stay in it mentally.”

Selby and Sun went 1-2 on Tuesday defeating the Dowling team of Frye and Wanek 6-2, 4-6, 6-4 and falling to the West Des Moines Valley team of Luke Berg and Beck Sissel 6-4, 6-4.

The Linn-Mar team of Garrett Bauermeister and Jackson Kramer defeated Selby and Sun in a tiebreak 4-6, 6-4 1-0 (6) in their final match of the day.

West High senior Jonathan Fan and Anil of City High each went 1-2, dropping their final match on Tuesday.

Fan defeated Althaus of Dubuque Hemsptead 4-6, 6-2, 6-1 before falling to top-seeded Caleb Peterson of Ankeny Centennial 6-0, 6-0 and Micah Flaherty of Fort Dodge 6-3, 4-6, 1-0 (6).

Anil rebounded from his opening loss to Shin with a 6-3, 6-3 win over Caden Launderville of Johnston but fell to Jason Strand of Marshalltown 0-6, 6-2, 1-0 (6) in the consolation second round.

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