Douglas Miles

Your Prep Sports

IOWA CITY – In their first exposure to high-level tennis competition, Anthony Medina and Derek Hua nearly won it all.

The West High seniors – with just one state singles appearance between them before Tuesday – charged through this year’s Class 2A state doubles bracket all the way to the championship match, where they were upended by a determined duo from Pleasant Valley.

“We both should be pretty proud of ourselves,” Hua said after he and Medina fell to Karthik Ganesh and Jatin Kodavatiganti of Pleasant Valley, 6-2, 6-2 and earned runner-up medals in 2A state doubles Wednesday at the Hawkeye Tennis and Recreation Center. “We completely outplayed our seed. We had a lot of tough battles, but we played our hearts out. I don’t think there is anything to be mad about.”

The Trojans’ twosome were the first doubles team from West High to reach the 2A doubles final since Jayden Shin and Samir Singh won the 2022 state doubles championship.

Medina and Hua got there by upsetting the top-seeded team from West Des Moines Valley in a Wednesday morning state semifinal, 6-1, 6-4.

“We showed up really early, got a good warmup in,” Medina said. “I think that is what really helped us. I think it was 8:30 this morning when we showed up before they did. It was a tough match, but we still pulled through.”

Medina and Hua entered the state tournament as the No. 4 doubles seed with just one loss all season (May 1 to William Feagler and Abhay Anil of Iowa City High).

Last season, Medina qualified for state singles, but Hua was making his state tournament debut. They played like wily veterans all tournament long.

“Immensely proud of our guys,” West High Coach Marshal Moellers said. “To come in as the four seed and neither of our players had played this level of competition in their whole lives. To play as well as they did, to come together as a team, especially against the Valley team earlier today, they put everything they have been putting into the whole season into play. Hugely proud of them.”

In the singles consolation bracket, City High’s Feagler closed his freshman season with a fifth-place finish after a pair of wins over seeded players.

Feagler first dispatched No. 3 Garrett Bauermeister of Linn-Mar via super tiebreaker, 6-3, 3-6, 1-0 (4).

In the fifth-place match, he upended second-seeded Micah Flaherty of Fort Dodge, 6-0, 6-2.

With the individual state tournament concluded, West High will now turn its attention to the team state tournament, where an eight-team field will compete June 3-4 at Waukee Northwest for the 2A team state championship.

West High – which won the 2A team title two years ago – will be vying for a state-best 12th team state championship.

“We always have the team mentality,” Medina said. “Nothing really happened here. To be fair, individual state is individual state, but I think I care more about team state. I think West High tennis is more team state-oriented than individual.”

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