Thunderbirds primed for third straight boys tennis title

SHORELINE — Win No. 50 is rapidly shrinking into a speck on the Shorewood boys tennis team’s rearview mirror.

And another Western Conference 4A South Division boys tennis championship is entering the horizon.

At the midway point of their schedule, the Thunderbirds appear headed toward a third straight unbeaten season.

Shorewood blanked once-beaten Kamiak 7-0 Monday afternoon to improve to 9-0 this fall and increase its winning streak to 56 consecutive matches dating back to 2000.

At the start of the year, it was unclear whether Shorewood’s three-year-old win streak would survive an early season encounter with Jackson.

But the T-birds dismissed Jackson 5-2 in the highly anticipated Sept. 15 contest and defeated their next six opponents by a combined match score of 41-1.

“We lost five quality seniors who played for four years and that’s hard to make up,” Shorewood coach Corliss Liekkio said. “But we’ve had lot of new kids step up to bat.”

So far, they’ve been swinging for the fences.

The T-birds have won more than 80 percent of their singles matches and Shorewood’s only doubles loss of the season was a 6-4, 6-4 defeat at No. 3 in a 6-1 victory over Meadowdale Sept. 12.

Scott Bourne and Steve McCall, Vincent Ma and Peter Reni and varsity newcomers Brenton Mestel and Aaron Lee top Shorewood’s deep doubles ladder.

“After No. 3, our next four teams are all the same (level),” Liekkio said. “Four, five and six are all a toss-up. It’s fun to have all those teams fighting for the third spot.”

Sophomore Nomar Mapalo has won all but one of his matches at No. 1 singles for the T-birds and Liekkio has filled the next three slots with a rotation of sophomores, juniors and seniors.

In a break from recent seasons, the league singles race appears somewhat cloudy. While clear-cut favorites surfaced before the district tournaments the past two years, Liekkio sees a much larger field of contenders this season.

“If I had to pick the top four, I’m not sure who I’d go with,” Liekkio said. “It’s wide open this year.”