Senior third singles, doubles reach finals of SCT
By: Bob Nuse
Eli Katz spent a lot of time on the tennis court Sunday. But for the Montgomery High senior, it was time well spent.
Katz won a pair of three-set matches on Sunday, winning both to advance to Monday night’s scheduled third singles final of the Somerset County Tournament. He will be joined in the finals by the Cougars’ second doubles team of Garrett Blitz and Chris Collins, who remained unbeaten with a pair of wins on Sunday.
With a pair of teams in the finals, Montgomery entered play on Monday night in second place in the SCT. Only Bridgewater-Raritan, which had all five flights in the finals, was ahead of the Cougars.
"This is my senior year so I really wanted to get to the finals," said Katz, who was slated to face Bridgewater’s Wayne Tai in the finals. "I had a couple of tough matches to get to the finals, but they were worth it. Hopefully I can play well and maybe come away with a win."
Tai is the only player to have beaten Katz this year, handing him a 6-1, 6-2 defeat during a regular season match in mid-April. Katz had won all eight of his other matches entering Monday’s final.
A year ago, Katz played first doubles for the Cougars, going 14-5 with partner Mike McManus, who is now playing second singles for Montgomery.
"I definitely like singles better," said Katz, who will be heading to the University of Oregon in the fall. "Last year when I was playing doubles, I would never get tired. Playing singles you need to have more stamina and there is more pressure on you because you only have yourself.
"I feel pretty good about the way I’ve been playing. I like the strategy that is involved with singles."
Even though this is his first year playing singles at the high school level, Katz is an experienced singles player. All of his play outside of high school tennis has been as a singles player.
"I play at Nassau (Racquet Club) and I play all singles when I play there," Katz said. "My first three years with the high school team I only played doubles (two years with the JV), but that was the only time I would ever play doubles. Outside of school I’ve played singles, so I was used to it."
As a team, the Cougars improved to 6-1 with their win over North Brunswick last Thursday. The only setback for the Cougars was a 4-1 loss to Bridgewater. With the Central Jersey Group II tournament on the horizon, the Cougars are hoping to continue their strong play.
"We’re building up for the states," Katz said. "Last year our second singles player got hurt and we wound up losing to Rumson in the semifinals. This year we’d like to win Central Jersey. We feel like we have a team that can do that. We had a couple weeks where we didn’t play matches because of the weather and spring break. But since we’ve come back we’ve played real well.
"I definitely don’t want it to end. The season is a lot of fun and we want to try to go as far as we can in the tournament."
Katz got his shot at an SCT title Monday night, as did Blitz and Collins. And down the road all of the Cougars are hoping for a shot at a sectional title as well.
"I think we can do it," Katz said. "We’ve got a good team."
"The team is playing well right now," Montgomery coach John Arnold added. "To get two into the finals is a nice accomplishment for the county tournament. And even a couple of the other flights had close matches. So I’m happy with where we are right now."

