Tonight was difficult....Our Cougars were prepared and ready to play.  Positive energy flowing all around.  The match started off with Chantilly switching their 1 and 2.  Didn't really matter as the match went on.  We had flipped our 3 and 4 as well.  Avery V. on 5 got ahead early and blew his opponent off the court with a strong serve and game (10-3).  Patrick on 6 was also up early and never let his lead slip, very focused play (10-5). They were off court first, and we have 2....Court 1 with Vishal started slow and picked up the second half of the set.  Unfortunately he was unable to recover the games lost early (6-10).  Matthew on 2 played a terrific match against a strong opponent.  He kept his nose just out in front until he widened the lead to 8-6, dropped a game, and proceeded to close out (10-7) whew!!!.   We have 3.... Meanwhile Alex on 3 and Nick on 4 are struggling against players who return every ball.  Nick had multitudes of deuces and game points and was not on the winning end of them.  Alex stayed with his opponent through the first half of the match, and then things got away....THEY have 3....seems familiar.  It comes down to dubs.  Court 1 with Vishal and Matthew felt a little flat.  They got down a break early and were not able to pull ahead even playing some good tennis.  Court 3 was a lock.  Our Avery's never flinched and stormed through the match quickly.  Now it's down to Court 2 with Alex and Charlie.....pretty much the entire set was on serve until the cougars took a game lead at 9-7. Chantilly held serve, we dropped serve and its 9 all....Chantilly holds again and Oakton fights to stay in their service game....it wasn't our day (9-11).  Match loss 4-5.  It's tough but the team knows that we will play again on Tuesday at home against Robinson, whom we beat 8-1 the first time around.  We will rebound and get ready for our final week of conference play. 

Nice job by our exhibition players who won All matches.  So good to know we have quality players at the ready!

Thanks to our snack families and all our DEVOTED fans who withstood the match stress and stayed to the bitter end!!  Alex and I appreciate it so much.  Hope to see you all next week.  

Tonight was a clean match for our Cougars.  YEA!   All 6 singles and 3 doubles got to work and finished early.....Very focused and determined play put us in a positive position.  No court dropped more than 2 games.  This was a tune up for our Thursday match with Chantilly, which will be challenging.  Coach Jo and I have been speaking to the players for the last 2 weeks about the mental aspect of the game.  Our losses thus far have been due to trouble closing, and self-confidence issues, and not the quality of our players.  I think after tonight our Cougars are ready to compete.

Also thanks to our exhibition players!  Another big W for them.  All played at least 2 matches.  Varsity letters are looming....

Senior Captain, Alex Naja, was sweating out when and if the PIZZA would arrive....snack duty can interfere with your match preparation....Singles are starting and Dad is just arriving with the food!  All is well and for the first time in memory we had more food than 16 teenaged boys could eat!  Thank you Naja'a

?Our fans keep us going, and our team parents, (Sara, Gretchen, Maria, and others) are making the things like senior night possible.  THANK YOU!  The boys really appreciate everything you do.

Maybe the best weather of the season for our match with Herndon today!   A 9-0 score pretty much tells the story.  Our singles players, Matthew on 1, Nick on 2, Alex on 3, Avery V on 4, Patrick on 5, and Michael on 6 were off the court in under 30 minutes!  Focused and consistent play brought us 6 quick W's.  The winning play continued into doubles with Matthew/Nick on 1, Alex/Charlie on 2, and the Avery's on 3.  All won convincingly for a total of 9 courts.  The exhibitions also won at love!  This was a little salve on the sore spots after Tuesdays loss at Westfield.  Next up is Centreville on Tuesday, followed by Chantilly on Thursday (both away matches)......The boy's have to be ready to play :-)

Thanks to our parents for coming out to cheer us on!  Also a big thanks to Vishal's dad for bringing a banquet of pizza and ice cream bars (sorry the fruit wasn't chosen!!).  A few of the players managed to finish ALL the Haagen Daaz.....Michael......

Our match with Westfield last night started off on a very positive note.  Without doing a play-by-play, it is enough to say that we should have gone into doubles with 4 if not 5 wins in singles.  We got 3.  Next, all of our dubs got off to a quick start and we were feeling good.... Court one goes to the Bulldogs, Court 2 goes to our Cougars, and only 3 is still playing.  By now our boys have been up, then down, then up, and then down.  Trying to get to a breaker was the goal.  Darkness and wind were not our friends and we lose the court.  Loss 4-5.

Today Coach Jo and I spoke with some of the players about closing out sets/matches.  These boys are accomplished tennis players and have the sport specific skills needed to be successful on court.  What they need to work on, and what we will continue to talk about with them, is the mental preparation.  Each of them need to develop their own routine to get and stay positive and forward moving.  I hope tomorrow will give our varsity players an opportunity to tidy up their mental game.

Please come out and continue to support our team!  They really do like to see fans especially when we are at home!  Weather looks very favorable....

Our Cougars showed up today and played an incredibly solid Match!  We went 8-1 against the Rams, after starting and getting rained out yesterday. We took 5 of 6 singles and the match was over.  I'll start with court 6, and Patrick.  He could not have played a cleaner match.  Confident and self possesed against a worthy opponent....He brought us our first W with a 10-3 score.  Avery V. on court 5 had to work so hard for the games he earned.  A score of 10-2 doesn't describe the high level of play.  We have 2.  Matthew on 2 was overpowering and totally offensive.  He bageled his opponent and did it in a very sportsman like way!  We have 3.  Court 4 with Alex was back and forth for the first 2/3 of the match.  He pushed the "get it done" button at 6/5 and ran off a string of 4 games for our 4th win.  Nick on 3 got down a few games early but mid-set starting playing his game.   Next match all the dots will connect...Court 1 with Vishal was under control from the beginning,  His opponent tried to fight but was under so much pressure with our Cougars firepower and serve that he folded (10-5).  That brought us our 5th singles win and the match!!

Doubles were exciting and, yes, we won them ALL to make it a 8-1 WIN!!

Court 1 with Vishal and Matthew was tight for the first 3 games with Robinson fighting and playing smart.  They played their 1 and 6.  However, Oakton had all the answers. (10-5).  Court 2 doubles featured Alex and Nick.  They got ahead early and NEVER looked back.  Another really solid performance (10-5).  Court 3 had our Avery's.  It was tight match from the start.  Good serving and net play from our team.   Neck and neck until the turn of the card mid-match making it 7-4.  From that point our cougars kept their nose out front and weathered many deuce games to bring in the final (10-8) W!!  Way to focus and find a way......

Sara, thank you for calling the troops to bring food!  The O'Connor's and numerous others made sure that the boys had plenty to eat during this long afternoon (of winning). Yay!  Also thanks to Mr. Liu for taking lots of pic's that we will all enjoy seeing.  

Our next match is Westfield on Tuesday (away).  Please join us if you can to cheer on our Cougars!

Our Cougars lost 4-5 to the Chantilly Chargers tonight during a 3 1/2 hour hard fought match.  Courts 1-3 singles with Vishal, Matthew, and Nicholas,  started off slow/sluggish and none we able to gain a lead throughout the 10 game set.  There were moments of very good play but not enough to get to the finish line.  Court 4 with Alex started off strong, drew even, and at 6-7 went downhill.  A few loose points turned into a few lost games, and a lost court.  Meanwhile on court 5,  Avery V kept his nose out front from the start and brought in our first W with a 10-3 score.  Michael, on court 6,  was also successful and handed the cougars their 2nd W with a 10-2 score.

It is sooo difficult going into doubles 2-4....knowing you HAVE to win all 3 doubles....We almost did it......

Vishal and Matthew on court 1 had a fast start, broke, and never looked back (10-6).  AV and AO on court 3 also had an extremely focused and well played set (10-2).  Court 2, with Charlie and Alex, got off to a VERY slow start, dropped 5 games, and had to make a comeback.  They put their minds and hearts into it and got the scorecard to read 6-7 before it got away (7-10).....Match score 4-5

On a high note our exhibitions were 100%   Congrats to these players!

Thanks also to our parents, fans, and of course our snack families who made the loss a little less painful with lots of PIZZA!  Please continue to support and cheer us on.  Hope to see many of you at Robinson on Thursday.

Coach T

Good match tonight against Centreville!  It looked like rain would make for a reschedule, but the sun came out and made for a perfect tennis day.  All 9 varsity courts were won easily by the Cougars and all exhibitions also went our way!  Thanks to the Jiang family for supplying so many pizzas and other snacks.  Also thanks to our parents and other fans for cheering us on!  Next week we move on to Robinson and Chantlly....hold on to your hats....

Having won both scrimmages with Flint Hill (8-1) and West Springfield(9-0) before Spring break, the team was ready to get the regular season started. 

Congrats to our Cougars on their first regular season match win against Herndon (9-0)! 

It was a perfect day to play, sunny and warmish.  Singles started off with Vishal at 1, Matthew at 2, Nick at 3, Alex at 4, AV at 5, and Patrick at 6.  All matches were concluded quickly and dropped very few games.  Nick had the most interesting match on 3 with Herndon's starting QB and BB player as his opponent!   The guy was a great athlete and put lots of balls back in play.  Nice job keeping your focus Nick!  Doubles teams for the day were Vishal/Matthew on 1, Alex/Charlie on 2, and AV/AO on 3.  There was only one game lost on all 3 courts combined!  Nice teamwork Cougars.  Lastly, all exhibition matches were won at love.....

Great way to kick off 2016 Tennis at OHS.  We will host Centreville, weather permitting, on Friday 4-1.  Come out and cheer us on.  The boys love to have cheering fans.

All interested and returning players need to have their paperwork ready for tryouts......

This includes a completed physical, emergency care card, and have completed the online concussion test (both player and parent)

This article was written by an independent journalist not affiliated with Oakton High School and the views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of Oakton High School.

This article was written by an independent journalist not affiliated with Oakton High School and the views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of Oakton High School.

This article was written by an independent journalist not affiliated with Oakton High School and the views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of Oakton High School.

This article was written by an independent journalist not affiliated with Oakton High School and the views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of Oakton High School.

This article was written by an independent journalist not affiliated with Oakton High School and the views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of Oakton High School.

This article was written by an independent journalist not affiliated with Oakton High School and the views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of Oakton High School.

This article was written by an independent journalist not affiliated with Oakton High School and the views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of Oakton High School.

This article was written by an independent journalist not affiliated with Oakton High School and the views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of Oakton High School.

This article was written by an independent journalist not affiliated with Oakton High School and the views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of Oakton High School.

This article was written by an independent journalist not affiliated with Oakton High School and the views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of Oakton High School.

This article was written by an independent journalist not affiliated with Oakton High School and the views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of Oakton High School.

This article was written by an independent journalist not affiliated with Oakton High School and the views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of Oakton High School.

This article was written by an independent journalist not affiliated with Oakton High School and the views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of Oakton High School.

This article was written by an independent journalist not affiliated with Oakton High School and the views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of Oakton High School.

This article was written by an independent journalist not affiliated with Oakton High School and the views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of Oakton High School.

This article was written by an independent journalist not affiliated with Oakton High School and the views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of Oakton High School.

This article was written by an independent journalist not affiliated with Oakton High School and the views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of Oakton High School.