Fike duos, Hunt’s Ellis and CBA’s Carlyle earn state tennis berths

ROCKY MOUNT — Out of the eight entries from schools in The Wilson Times readership area in the first round of the NCHSAA 3-A East Regional for boys tennis Friday at North Carolina Wesleyan University, half are still in the running for a regional title.

Both Fike High doubles teams — Snyder Pearson-Collins Pearson and Dylan Skinner-Zachary Hill — qualified for the state 3-A championship by reaching the East semifinals while Hunt senior Alex Ellis and C.B. Aycock senior Ethan Carlyle will reprise their 3-A Quad County Conference championship (won by Carlyle) in Saturday’s singles semifinals.

Six of the eight area entries won their first-round matches Friday. Pearson-Pearson, the Quad County champion, blitzed South Brunswick’s Andrew Ferguson-Nate Ware 6-0, 6-0 to start then erased CBA’s Aric Martin-Jack Williams 6-1, 6-0 in the second round.

Skinner-Hill, the 2023 QCC champion and runner-up in 2022 and this year, handled Jacksonville’s Steven Le-Duane Batin 6-0, 6-1 before turning back South Central’s Hayden Collier-Jeremy Le 6-1, 6-0.

Pearson-Pearson will face the Greenville Rose tandem of Wyatt Schmidt-Ethan Tang in one semifinal on Saturday while Skinner-Hill get the defending regional champ and top seed in First Flight’s Anthony Vucinovic-J.J. Woerner.

Ellis, the No. 3 singles seed, swept First Flight’s Joshua Gray 6-0, 6-0 before downing West Brunswick’s Kyle McCoy 6-1, 6-0 to reach the rematch with No. 2 Carlyle, who also beat Ellis in the Quad County singles final when both were sophomores in 2022.

Fike’s Snyder Pearson beat Carlyle on his way to the regional singles crown last spring.

In the other singles semifinal, top-seeded Shaw Akula of South Central goes against 3-A/4-A Big Carolina Conference rival Kaiji Fu of Greenville Rose. Akula ousted CBA’s Journey Perry in the first round and beat Hunt’s Anthony Romero in the second round, both by 6-0, 6-0 scores, while Fu knocked out Fike’s Cian Bonner 6-2, 6-0 in the first round.

Romero got past Croatan’s James Baile 7-6(4), 6-2 in the first round as Hunt went 3-1 on the day.

The top four finishers in each region qualify for the NCHSAA tournament, to be held next Friday and Saturday, May 10-11, at Burlington Tennis Center for 3-A.

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