After a taxing match lasting about 2 hours and 15 minutes Thursday at Manteca Regional Tennis Center, Emma Ngo didn’t have the energy to celebrate her latest achievement with teammates.
The Manteca junior was understandably spent after the hard-earned 6-7 (2), 6-3, 7-6 (5) victory over Central Catholic’s Mianna Robinson in the Valley Oak League Tournament singles final.
“I’m super surprised right now,” Ngo said. “I was close to giving up.”
Ngo follows in the footsteps of standout Katie Kim, who garnered the last two VOL singles championships and went on to win two SJS individual tournament crowns.
Ngo has stepped in as the new No. 1 player for Manteca, which made the SJS team playoffs as the second-place team out of the VOL.
“To go from 3 (singles) to 1, it’s a huge jump,” Manteca coach MaryAnn Tolbert said. “She was playing 3s last year and just mowing everybody, but this year we didn’t know where she would go. She obviously dug in deep and went undefeated all season.”
Getting past Robinson, also the VOL runner-up last year, only got tougher later in the season. Ngo beat her twice in league dual matches but had to work for it. Scores were 7-6 (4), 6-4 and 6-3, 1-6, 6-3.
“This one was just much more pressure,” Ngo said. “I was just contradicting myself; I won the first two matches, but what if I don’t’ win this one?”
She started strong, taking the first three games. Robinson took five of the next six before clinching the opener in the tiebreaker.
“She has a really good forehand, and my forehand was not good today — it was all going out,” Ngo said. “Honestly, I was just trying to keep it in and not let the emotions get to me.”
Ngo bounced back in the second set, jumping out to a 4-1 lead before locking it down. The third set was a marathon that went back-and-forth the entire way.
“It’s hard to play the same person three times,” Tolbert said. “They always say that in most sports, it’s rough to win three times in a row (against the same opponent). Obviously, it was here. It came all the way down to that tiebreaker.”
In doubles play, only one local tandem advanced to the semifinals. Manteca’s Shreya Raman and Christina Nguyen won two matches before running into Payton and Riley Avila of VOL champion Oakdale. The Avilas swept 6-0, 6-3 and went on to defeat Kaylee Shaver and Maddie McTayve teammates 6-2, 6-2 in the title round.
Raman and Nguyen faced Lena Amato and Aanshi Thakur for third place and prevailed, 6-3, 7-6 (5). Only the singles and doubles finalists move onto the individual Section tournament this season.
