Spartans tennis teams qualify for state

The road to repeating as state champions will be challenging, but both Mountain Brook High School tennis teams accomplished a big step in that journey earlier this week.

The Spartans boys and girls tennis teams advanced out of the Class 7A, Section 3 tournaments, which were held at Spain Park High School. The girls played on Monday, with the boys going on Tuesday. 

The top two teams in each sectional qualified for the state tournament, to be held at the Mobile Tennis Center next Monday and Tuesday, April 23-24. In each sectional, there are six singles brackets and three doubles brackets.

On Monday, Mountain Brook won the girls sectional with a score of 54, while Vestavia Hills tallied 44 points. Spain Park was a distant third with 26 points and Hoover was fourth with 21 points.

For the Spartans, four singles players and two doubles tandems came away with victories. Emma Karcher (No. 1), Madison Jenkins (No. 3), Liz Vandevelde (No. 4) and Maggie Duggan (No. 6) won their respective brackets. No. 5 singles player Whitton Bumgarner advanced to the final and No. 2 Charlotte Gillum was a semifinalist. 

In doubles, the No. 1 tandem of Karcher and Vandevelde and the No. 2 pair of Gillum and Jenkins each won the title. No. 3 team May McInnis and Warner Johnson advanced to the final. 

On Tuesday, Vestavia Hills scored 50 points to Mountain Brook's 42 in the boys tournament. Spain Park was third with 28 points. 

For the Spartans, William Watts (No. 2) and Aidan Cabraja (No. 3) won their singles brackets, while the No. 2 team of Cabraja and Stuart Phelan won in doubles. No. 4 Haskins Jones and No. 6 Phelan fell in the finals and No. 1 Andrew Karcher and No. 5 Jonathan Wheeler advanced to the semifinals. Karcher and Watts, the No. 1 doubles team, advanced to the finals, while No. 3 tandem Jones and Cars Chandler were semifinalists.

The Spartans still advanced to state even with being forced to replace several starters from last season's team.

The boys have won three consecutive state championships and the girls won it all last year for the first time since 2014.

Glenn Lamar and Caroline Hall assist coach Susan Farlow with the tennis teams.