Jackson Weisbrot leads Half Hollow Hills West to Suffolk tennis crown
Jackson Weisbrot relished his new position.
After two razor-thin defeats in the regular season, he knew his Hills West team needed to shake things up. Weisbrot not only stepped into the leading role but flourished under the added pressure, defeating Abhinav Srivastava, 6-4, 6-2, at first singles as the No. 3 Colts took down unbeaten and top-seeded Half Hollow Hills East, 4-2, for the Suffolk boys tennis team championship on Thursday.
“Coming into the match I just felt like if I could be consistent and play my game I’d be able to win,” Weisbrot said. “I was confident in what I’d be able to do if I got my first serves in and didn’t make too many unforced errors.”
Weisbrot broke Srivastava’s serve late in the first set to go ahead 5-4 and finished it off with a forehand that hit the net but found its way over.
“I was trying to hit the ball to his backhand and attack there,” Weisbrot said. “From there he was giving me a lot of short balls in the middle, where I was able to hit approach shots into the corner and come up to the net and finish off some points.”
Aziz Rashidzada, playing at first doubles instead of the first singles position he occupied in the earlier matchups with Hills East (17-1), teamed with Dan Rubinowitz to knock off Adam Wilck and Justin Dubler, 6-4, 7-6 (3), in the clinching match.
“Adam and Justin are great players,” Rubinowtiz said. “We were able to capitalize when we got opportunities and took some chances when they came.”
Hills West (16-3) also picked up wins from its third-doubles team of Spencer Kirshman and Rohan Mathur, who won, 6-4, 6-2, over Adam Stein and Paul Rhee, and third singles Tyler Nierman, who won, 6-1, 6-3, over Bradley Weltman.
“We knew that in order to win this match we had to improve our doubles lineup. If we came into this match with the same lineup they would have had a huge advantage against us,” Rashidzada said. “The lineup we had today was our best lineup to beat East.”
This is the seventh year in a row a team from the Half Hollow Hills district has won the championship — the last two for West.
“Being a senior I’ve been on this team for six years now,” Rashidzada said. “It’s just a surreal feeling knowing we won back to back.”