When the Los Banos Tigers teams moved up in the Central California Conference (CCC) after the 2024 school year, most expected the Tigers to struggle in the much larger division, and for the most part, that expectation has played out.
However, no one let the Los Banos tennis teams in on that prediction, as the Tigers girls tennis team finished second in the CCC without their number one player, Melina Mejia, who is out with a torn ACL in her knee.
With their two victories this past week, the Tigers boys team (7–1 CCC) is in a first-place tie with the Merced Bears. On March 25, the Tigers swept the Buhach Colony Thunder by 9–0 to improve to 6–1 in conference play.
The Tigers’ number one player, Justin Gould, and number two player, Nick Tova, claimed 6–0 and 6–0 match sweeps over their Thunder counterparts. Yahir Zuniga (6–1, 6–3) and Noah Cardenas (6–0, 6–1) made four consecutive match wins for Los Banos.
Nelson Fabian (6–0, 6–3) and Tyler Meza (6–0, 6–1) rounded out the singles match victories for the locals. On March 27, Los Banos hosted the previously undefeated Merced Bears (7–0 CCC), the only team to defeat the Tigers in the 2025 tennis season.
Coaches Lynn and J.T. Barcellos’s Tigers used grit and determination to avenge their earlier defeat to the Bears and came away with a 6–3 victory over Merced and a share of first place with the Bears in the CCC.
After losing their number one and two player matches, the Tigers (7–1 CCC) swept the four remaining singles matches and claimed two of the three doubles matches to hand Merced (7–1 CCC) their first loss by 6–3.
Tova (7–6, 4–6, 6–4), Zuniga (6–4, 6–3), Cardenas (6–4, 6–2) and Meza (6–1, 6–2) won their singles matches.
The doubles teams of Nelson Fabian and Drake Field (6–4, 4–6, 7–6) and Sebastian Polini and Brody Benton (6–4, 3–6, 6–3) closed out the victory for the first-place Los Banos Tigers.
After the match, Zuniga told the Express, “Bring on the CCC. We can hang with any team in the league.”
