Draws for the 2019 Class 4A boys tennis state tournament, held October 17-19 in Pueblo, are below.
All matches start at 9 a.m. each day. The first two rounds at each position will be played Thursday. Friday morning will be all semifinals, and the playback matches will start immediately afterwards. All third- and fourth-place matches and finals will be at 9 a.m. on Saturday morning.
Should weather intervene, check CHSAANow for contingency plans.
These results will be updated throughout the tournament.
For more information on the process for creating these brackets, click here or scroll down.
[divider]
2019 Class 4A boys tennis state tournament
Click on a tab to see that bracket, or team scores.
Information on the state tournament and draw creation
Only those teams who qualify four or more positions to state are eligible for the CHSAA state team championship title. The bracket creation process is as follows:
All 16 individuals/teams will be considered for placement on the draw.
The top 4 individuals/teams will be placed.
The committee shall consider the following factors (in no particular order of importance): strength of league, overall record, strength of competition, head-to-head competition and common opponents.
The remaining Regional Winners (#1’s) will be randomly drawn for places on the draw.
The Regional Finishers (#2’s) will then be randomly drawn for matches against a Regional Winner.
All Regional Winners will be paired against a Regional Finishers.
No two teams or individuals from the same Region will play each other during the first round of the state championship.
In anticipation of snow on Thursday, and cold temperates on Friday, site directors have been authorized to change the dates, if needed.
Most regionals are scheduled for Thursday and Friday, but a snowstorm is expected to bring more than 2 inches of snow to the Denver metro area on Thursday, as well as a high of 30 degrees.
Snow is also expected in the northern part of the state on Thursday, with highs in the upper 20s. The southern part of the state may also get snow on Thursday, and the forecast is calling for a high in the low 40s. Grand Junction is not expected to get snow on Thursday, but the high is expected to be 45 degrees.
Friday’s forecast calls for a high in the 40s in most of the state, and 50 in Grand Junction.
As a result of this expected weather, play on Tuesday is an option, as well as on Sunday. Regionals must be completed prior to Monday’s seeding meeting.
It is up to each site director to determine how to finish regionals, and the dates of play.
The state tennis tournaments are next week, running Thursday through Friday.
On Sunday, the City of Aurora will hold a naming center in honor of former Overland coach Woodie Smith at the Utah Park Tennis Courts.
The facility will be dedicated as the Woodie M. Smith Tennis Center in a ceremony at 1 p.m.
“Woodie’s impact on OHS, high school sports, and the Colorado tennis community is immeasurable,” said Overland athletic director Karl Buck.
Smith, the longtime tennis coach at Overland, passed away in March after a long battle with cancer. He was 72.
A 1964 graduate of Mullen, Smith was also a football, basketball and track coach, as well as a basketball official. He was on the original staff at Overland when it opened in 1978.
He stayed at Overland for 28 years, and received the Lifetime Trailblazer Hall of Fame Award in 2018. In addition to being a coach and teacher, Smith was also athletic director for eight years. He retired from teaching in 2005, but continued to coach tennis until 2018.
In 2017, Smith received the Distinguished Service Award from CHSAA. He was on the Association’s Board of Directors, then known as the Executive Committee, for eight years, was the CHSAA president from 2004-05.
Nick Lorenz of Discovery Canyon was a senior and looking to find that elusive state title. He ended up running into a buzzsaw in Colorado Academy’s Richter Jordaan. But those two were far from the only stars on the court that weekend.
Niwot junior Neil Wilcox looked strong in the first two rounds of the tournament first beating Alameda senior Kenny Orive 6-2, 6-1 and then dispatching Cheyenne Mountain junior Joey Geisz 6-1, 2-6, 6-3.
Then he ran into Jordaan, the eventual No. 1 singles champion. Jordaan won the semifinal match 6-1, 6-2 and sent Wilcox to the consolation bracket. Then a sophomore, Wilcox regained his composure and won his next two matches in straight sets to take third place.
Heading into this year, it isn’t the wins that helped him learn last year, but rather his loss to Jordaan. With two more chances to go for gold, it was a reminder that at the state tournament everyone is playing at a high level.
“Last year I went in very confident and felt like I had a chance,” Wilcox said. “I lost because I was overconfident.”
(Ryan Casey/CHSAANow.com)
Sitting at the fall sports media day hosted by the Denver Broncos, Wilcox looked every bit the humbled and controlled athlete that he needs to be to survive a grueling tennis season. He maintains that staying humble will help him generate the results he wants and that has been clear early this season.
In the Cougars’ season-opening dual against Peak to Peak, Wilcox came away with a decisive 6-0, 6-0 victory. He followed that with a 6-2, 6-2 win over Thompson Valley.
Niwot is 2-0 as a team to start the year with duals against Centaurus and Dawson on the horizon. A big key for Wilcox is that he’s trying to focus solely on the task in front of him rather than what his solid play can do for him later in the year.
“This year I have to make sure I just go in and play my game and make sure I don’t spend too much time thinking about it,” he said.
With both Lorenz and Jordaan graduated, Wilcox can enter the 2019 state tournament as the most successful returning player. Geisz is back for the Indians and the field will also consist of talented underclassmen such as Steamboat Springs sophomore Andy Schuiling.
The 2019 season is starting off on a high note for Wilcox as he stands 2-0 after joining several of the state’s top athletes at the UC Health Center at Dove Valley in early August.
“This is kind of crazy for me,” he said sitting at the podium. “I’ve never done anything like this before.”
If he plays to to his potential and maintains his focus throughout this season, he’ll be getting similar media attention. And as just a junior, he has plenty of time to get used to it.
Social media can be a tool for success or a detriment to one’s growth through their desired activity or profession.
That’s what Denver Broncos senior strategic communications manager Seth Medvin spent time telling the high school athletes that made their way through the Pat Bowlen Fieldhouse. During the CHSAA and Denver Broncos fall sports media day, Medvin provided a lecture on social media use and how to use it in a way that is responsible and positive.
“The unique thing with social media training for high school athletes is they’re exposed to it than even pro athletes are right now,” Medvin said. “We’re getting rookies in that were very active on social media when they were in high school. Athletes coming out now, they’ve been on social media since they were in maybe elementary school. It’s important as they’ve had much more experience in it that the education is more important at a younger age because it sticks with them and it really is their digital footprint.”
It’s something that the players might be told about from time to time but getting a thorough lesson about the dangers of social media and how to protect themselves served as a bit of a wakeup call.
The levels of play might be different, but the lessons learned can transcend those levels. Social media posts can fuel intensity before a game or cast a player in poor light when simply looking at typed words with no context.
(Ryan Casey/CHSAANow.com)
Medvin’s goal was to to show young players hoping to have a future in their sport of choice how to be preventative when it comes to getting into trouble with Twitter or Instagram. And it was a message that a lot of the kids paid attention to.
“I think it was a great thing for us,” Hoehne lineman Antonio Moltrer said. “As kids, we’re going to do dumb stuff. This helped us open our eyes to make sure we don’t (do those dumb things).”
Medvin didn’t hold back on his examples. He pointed out current professional athletes and referenced their draft stock ahead of teams digging into their social media pasts. The tweets that were uncovered were less than flattering.
And the consequences that followed were jarring. Rather than being a first round pick, this guy went in the fourth. With that came a salary difference of this many millions of dollars. And he stressed that even if a kid’s future isn’t in professional athletics, those things can still come back and cause havoc when finding a job or applying for schools.
The coaches in attendance were also appreciative of the message. Sometimes with high school athletes – or even just kids in general — a lecture from a coach or a teacher can be disregarded fairly easily. When the Denver Broncos deliver the message, however, they tend to perk up a bit.
“I think it’s great exposure,” Otis volleyball coach Bonnie Wallin-Kuntz said. “These kids are living in a glass bubble and everyone is looking at them daily. I don’t think they realize that people are watching and looking. They have to be aware of it.”
And they need to be aware of it now. As group after group sat in front of a projector and listened to Medvin, his passion and emphasis never eased. Every football player coming through the facility would love to play for the Denver Broncos. But that path doesn’t begin after it high school. It doesn’t begin during a college football career. It starts with the little things these kids are doing right now on a daily basis.
“What they do can affect them tomorrow,” Medvin said. “These kids are coming and going into colleges. I’m sure these colleges are searching for social media profiles. It is so easy to find negatives in their accounts, but it’s also really easy to build a positive profile and start the positive use of social media at a young age.”
When jokingly asked, several players said they didn’t have to jump online and delete any posts after listening to Medvin. It’s a good start, but the hope is that the message sinks in even years down the road.
