CHARLESTON, W.Va. — As a result of expected rain that ultimately began to fall around noon, all Friday matches in the WVSSAC State Tennis Tournament were moved indoors.
A change in venue from the Kanawha City Community Center to the Charleston Tennis Club for Class AAA did little to slow down two of the state’s premier programs.
For the second straight year and third time in four seasons, the Hurricane boys claimed a state championship by way of a 4-2 victory against Woodrow Wilson.
“It wasn’t a given that we’d win, but I knew we had the boys that could rise to the occasion,” Hurricane coach Andy Ball said. “They don’t know how to do anything else.”
On the girls side, Huntington edged Morgantown 4-3, giving the Highlanders their first state championship since 2021 and 14th overall for a program with separate four-peats.
“Give Morgantown their flowers. That’s a great team,” Huntington coach T.J. Cisco said. “We’re fortunate to get the win today. This one is different. A lot would say by the program’s standard it’s been a long time. It’s extra special because this group of seniors is an extremely tight group.”
Hurricane wrapped up the boys championship first, a result largely predicated on the play of its top player in senior Jacob Smolder. Smolder defeated Ram Asaithambi 8-2 in a singles match and teamed with Kellen Pauley to earn an 8-3 doubles victory over Asaithambi and Ethan Shepard.
“You have to play the opponent and you know their strokes, serves and how they hit the ball, but also have to worry about how you hit the ball and set up and if you think too much about the opponent, you might lose some focus on yourself,” Smolder said.
Smolder felt well-prepared to compete at state through previous seasons as well as what led up to this point in 2025.
“The competition definitely gets us ready. It’s great to play good competition before you play other good competition,” Smolder said. “It gets your mind accumulated to how you’ll play and the mental standpoint like pressure from the finals.”
Hurricane also got a strong effort from No. 3 singles player Elias Kave, who earned an 8-0 win over Tyler Radford and combined with teammate Grant Knapp for an 8-4 doubles victory against Radford and William ‘Vince’ Umberger.
Knapp and Umberger’s singles match was cut short before finishing after the Redskins secured the necessary fourth win to wrap up the result.
“I schedule the best teams in the state, because they need to play the best teams,” Ball said. “They go play teams in Kentucky and it helps get them better because we won’t pass anybody up.”
Shepard defeated Pauley 8-0 in singles play, while Woodrow Wilson notched a second victory in doubles play with the tandem of Nicholas Fultz and Samuel Croci scored an 8-5 victory against Johnson Gabhart and Nicholas Castro.
The girls final was competitive throughout, with the Highlanders winning one of three doubles matches and three of four in singles play, including each of the final two to prevail past the Mohigans.
“It’s definitely a lot of pressure and we went into it thinking we would win two of the two doubles, so when we only won one doubles match, it was even more pressure,” Huntington captain Lilah Haynes said.
Haynes was defeated by Anika Chadha in a singles match, but Huntington benefited from singles victories by Baby Jones, Olivia Akers and freshman Julianne Leach. Jones defeated Maya Greenlee 8-0, Akers topped Natalia Chassim 8-1 and Leach posted an 8-2 victory against Andrea Radar-Goodykoontz.
“That was amazing. She was able to handle a lot of the pressure and she hasn’t really done that before,” Haynes said of Leach. “I’m so proud of her and very impressed.”
Combined with Akers and Jones defeating Chadha and Greenlee in doubles, that gave the Highlanders the necessary four victories to leave with their desired hardware.
“When you have a group that’s this talented and deep, often times finding ways to challenge them so that they’re prepared is something a coach has to do,” Cisco said. “All year long, it’s been a lot about holding Baby out, playing people up, putting pressure in different spots on different days so that should we ever end up in this tight situation, hopefully they are as prepared as can be.”
Cassim and Radar-Goodyknotz combined for a No. 2 doubles victory for Morgantown, which also got a win from the duo of Joyce Hu and Tina Chen in a doubles match.
The state tournament concludes Saturday with the championship rounds in singles and doubles play.