Taking its best swing

Mike Sciacca

The Laguna Beach High boys’ tennis team seemingly has it all:

talented players, an enthusiastic team and outstanding sportsmanship.

So, what’s missing from this picture?

Nothing -- at the moment, but the one thing this team might not

possess this season is a CIF playoff berth.

By the time May rolls around, Laguna may be one of the best teams

not to be included in the postseason picture.

The Breakers resume Pacific Coast League play on Monday at Corona

del Mar, followed by a Tuesday match at Northwood. After that,

matches against Tesoro on May 6 and a regular season finale on May 8

at University close out their league schedule.

Currently, Laguna (8-8 overall) resides in fourth place in the

league standings behind Corona del Mar, Northwood and University.

“We will have to beat University or Northwood by an equal or

better score to qualify for the playoffs,” Laguna coach Brian Ricker

said. “We have a good team with very good depth but we are

unfortunate to be in a league that has three teams ranked in the top

10.”

Laguna has been in this situation before.

Two years ago, Corona del Mar and University were generally

considered, Ricker said, the top two teams in the nation. Laguna

split its regular season matches with Northwood but lost a

third-place playoff match to Northwood. Despite the strength of the

league, the CIF did not extend to Laguna a Division V at-large

playoff invitation.

The season was over.

Just last year, Laguna finished the season with a nonwinning

record which disqualified the team from playoff consideration.

That came during a season in which University won the CIF Division

II title, Corona del Mar the Division V crown and Northwood finished

runner-up in Division IV.

Ricker called this season’s team “improved” from last year.

“Especially when we are healthy,” he said. “The conduct and

sportsmanship of our players is impeccable.”

The Breakers power early in the season, he said, could be found in

doubles play. Ricker noted that is was due to the fact that top

singles player, senior Andrew Ghenender, was returning from a slight

tear in his Achilles tendon, an injury he suffered in a snowboarding

accident just before the start of the season.

In the second round of league play, the return of Ghenender paired

with the play of Dieter Schmitz should strengthen Laguna’s singles

line-up.

Since Ghenender came back to the lineup, Laguna has downed Webb,

the No. 8 team in Division IV, and Edison, ranked third in the

county.

Lincoln Berger and Michael Codini, both at No. 3 singles, have

turned in solid performances this season.

The power in doubles play starts at the top, but the play of the

No. 2 team of Ivan Kovacevic and Kyle Paxton has been sensational.

The two, whom Ricker says are the “most athletic players I have

seen all season,” thus far have posted a 28-7 record.

Kovacevic, a 6-foot-3 sophomore who started this year on Laguna’s

varsity basketball team, is “very fast, very agile, extremely

coachable and plays smart tennis,” Ricker said.

“The interesting thing about Ivan is that his first love is truly

basketball,” Ricker said of Kovacevic, who carries a 4.67 GPA. “He

only plays tennis two-and-a-half months a year and arrives late for

the start of the season due to basketball.

“The first day Ivan arrived for tennis this season I told him what

I thought he needed to do to have a successful season. I have never

had to mention any of those issues again. He is extremely coachable.”

Paxton, meanwhile, brings senior leadership to the squad. He is a

returning all-league player who has worked his way through the ranks

at Laguna.

He took up tennis as a freshman and moved up to the junior varsity

team that year. After the season he dedicated himself to tennis and

in a sixth month span had worked his way to No. 2 varsity singles.

As a sophomore he played both singles and doubles where he and

Eric Tran turned in a solid season. The two reached the quarterfinals

of doubles play at the league tournament.

“If we have a more gifted athlete on the team than Ivan, it is

Kyle,” Ricker said. “He’s extremely fast, strong and a good leaper.

Sometimes he tries to get away with his athleticism instead of

playing with consistency which makes for exciting tennis to watch.”

The Kovacevic/Paxton duo starts this season behind Laguna’s top

doubles team of Tran and Jeff Ferguson.

“They give us a great one-two punch in doubles,” Ricker said. “By

mid-season Kyle and Ivan were definitely our strongest team but

Ferguson and Tran have responded to the challenge and have pretty

much evened things up lately.

“I’m very excited for both of these teams’ chances in the league

tournament. Both teams are capable of beating any team in our

league.”

The Pacific Coast League tournament will begin on May 12 with CIF

preliminaries to follow on May 17.

But first, Ricker and the Breakers have the rest of the regular

season schedule to contend with -- where a possible CIF playoff berth

hangs in the balance.

“Hopefully we can come up with a big victory in the next two

weeks,” he added.

* MIKE SCIACCA covers sports for the Laguna Beach Coastline Pilot.

He can be reached at 494-4321 or by e-mail at

michael.sciacca@latimes.com.