One is closing out a highly decorated high school career; the other is at the beginning with a bright future ahead. Both are now champions.
Liberty senior Nikhil Andhavarapu and Century freshman Bella Filippi won the boys and girls singles titles Tuesday in the finals of the Carroll County tennis tournament.
In doubles divisions, Liberty’s Arjun Mistry and Hayden Speace continued their unbeaten year with the county boys doubles championship. Manchester Valley’s Madison McGregor and Talula Castanzo won the girls doubles title and Liberty’s mixed doubles team of Grace Maerten and Louis Major became the Lions’ third title entry.
Andhavarapu has been a key piece of Liberty’s back-to-back Class 1A state championship teams playing mostly doubles. He won the state doubles championship with Mistry in 2022. Last year, after playing second singles behind two-time Player of the Year Honour Zan, he teamed back up with Mistry and they finished as state runners-up.
This season, Andhavarapu has been the Lions’ No. 1 player all year and was matched up in the county final against Winters Mill’s Micah Ober, the only person to beat him this season. Andhavarapu cruised to a 6-3, 6-1 win. This followed a 6-1, 6-2 semifinal win over Century’s Kaushik Inguva and a 6-0, 6-0 win over Francis Scott Key’s Jon Adcock.
Filippi has been dominant in her first varsity year. She dropped two total games through the first two rounds and faced defending county champion Daphnee Whitmore of Westminster in the final. The two played a three-set match April 29 in which Filippi faced the toughest challenge of her young career but came out on top. Tuesday, they played another three-set thriller and once again Filippi came out on top, 6-4, 2-6, 10-7.
In boys doubles, Mistry and Speace capped off an unbeaten county season with the tournament title. They dropped just one game through the first two rounds and beat Westminster’s Michael Fronheiser and Jarom Hawes in the finals, 6-2, 7-6 (3).
South Carroll’s Audrey Lillycrop and Caroline Altifiras entered the county tournament as the No. 1 seed in girls doubles but had not yet faced MacGregor and Castanzo this season. Though they have been the primary top doubles team for the Mavericks, Castanzo played singles in the one regular-season match against the Cavaliers.
MacGregor and Catanzo entered the county tournament seeded third. They beat Liberty’s Amelia Mustico and Peyton Oakley, 6-2, 7-6 (6) in the semifinals, then topped Lillycrop and Aliftiras, 7-6 (1), 6-3 in the finals.
Maerten has been at No. 1 singles most of the season for the Lions but has been known as a postseason doubles specialist. She won last year’s county mixed doubles title with one partner and finished state runner-up with another. In 2022, she was one half of the girls doubles state championship team.
This year, she teamed with Major for the county tournament, Liberty’s second boys singles player this season, and were awarded the top seed. They closed with 6-3, 7-5 win in the finals over South Carroll’s Michael Mooney and Sydney Mossman.