LAUREL COUNTY, Ky. — WILLIAMSBURG—They lived up to their tournament seeding.

Coming into the region tennis tournament, South Laurel’s Neha Rao and North Laurel’s doubles team of Brad Baker and Rajeev Jadhav were seeded No. 1, Rao in girls’ singles and Baker/Jadhav in boys’ doubles. Both were expected to win region titles.

And they did, though it didn’t come easy.

Rao captured her second straight region title with a 6-4, 6-2 win over Corbin’s Sydney Ledington. Coming into the finals, Rao had only dropped two games in her four matches. One to Corbin’s Catherine Crawford in the quarterfinals, and one to Middlesboro’s Trinity Goodman in the semifinals.

“It feels good to win my second straight region title,” Rao said. “I think I could have played better (in the finals) but I’m glad I pulled it out and won.”

Rao was leading 5-2 in the first set before Ledington, the number three seed, battled back to cut the lead to 5-4. But Rao regrouped and won the final two games for a 6-4 win.

Like in the first set, Rao built a 5-2 lead in the second set, but this time, there would be no comeback by Ledington. Serving for the match, Rao easily won the last game for the 6-4, 6-2 win as she remains unbeaten on the season.

To get to the finals, Rao defeated Middlesboro’s Trinity Goodman, 6-0, 6-1.

After the first set of the boys’ doubles final, North’s Baker and Jadhav found themselves down a set, as Corbin’s Seth Heiness/Josh Jewell took the first set, 6-1.

“I felt Brad was a little off and rushing a little too much early on in the match,” North Laurel coach Bobby Smith said. “And Seth and Josh really played well that first set.  Seth was a regional winner in doubles last year, and I love Josh’s game—just a hard-nosed kid who is a great net player.”

While North Laurel fans might have been a little concerned, the duo wasn’t.

“I wasn’t worried,” Baker said. “We knew we had to get it back and that we couldn’t fold under the pressure.”

They didn’t. North Laurel won the second set, 6-4, then cruised to a 6-1 win in the third set to take the region title in the battle of the top two seeded teams.

“This was such a great win for us,” Smith said. “What I was so happy with was that when we were down 6-1, 1-0 against a very good team, we didn’t panic.  We didn’t start to doubt ourselves.  We didn’t lose it emotionally.  We showed a lot of poise at that point in the match and believed that we were still going to win the match.  We kept forcing the issue and really upped our level of play.”

In the third set, after Corbin won the first game, North reeled off six straight games to win the match. Both Baker and Jadhav held their serves while they broke Corbin’s three times. In winning game five and six, North didn’t allow a single Corbin point.

“I’m so proud of Rajeev—when we started working with him three years ago, he had no idea how to play doubles,” Smith said. “Didn’t like playing doubles.  Had no clue how to serve and volley. Didn’t know how to move around the court. But he loves it now, and he’s turned himself into a darn good doubles player. And so very proud for Brad—his senior year capped off with a doubles championship. He and Rajeev definitely have an argument to be considered the best doubles team we’ve ever had at North.”

Baker’s older brother, James Montgomery, teamed with Gil Bagang and finished runner-up in 2008.

“It feels good to win the region,” Baker said. “There’s no words to really describe it,” Jadhav added. “It just feels good.”

“But to sum it up, I’m so very proud of the boys performance,” Smith said. We had to face some adversity in both matches, and we responded well both times. This was their goal at the start of the season—a regional championship —and they went out and earned it.”

To get to the finals, North beat Corbin’s Chandler Maguet/Connor Maguet, 6-4, 6-3.

“Those Maguet boys are pretty savvy players,” Smith said. “They both have great hands and great reflexes, and they made us really work for the win. We got down 4-1 early, but Brad started returning better. He’s got a great slice backhand return, but he wasn’t utilizing it early on. When he started hitting that, it gave them some problems. But it was a great match for us in that they forced us to take it - they didn’t give us much of anything. Very talented team we beat in the semis.”

The other two North Laurel doubles teams didn’t fare as well, both falling in the quarterfinals.

In girls’ doubles, Caroline Moore and Pooja Kanthawar lost to Corbin’s Shelby Phillips/Julie Crawford, 6-4, 7-6 (5).

It was a tough loss for the North girls. They were up 5-0 in the second set, looking to close it out and force a third set. But Corbin battled back to win in a tiebreaker.

“We got ahead 5-0 in the second set, but we just didn’t close out the set and made a lot of silly errors,” Smith said. “If we could have gotten the second set, I would have felt good about the third. We’ve come out on top in several three-setters this year, including our quarterfinal win here at regionals.  Luckily we still get to advance on and play at state next week.”

The other boys’ team, Travis Evans and Spencer Bolton, fell to Corbin’s Seth Heiness/Josh Jewell, 6-3, 6-2.

“We knew this was going to be a tough match, but the boys came out on fire and played well early on,” Smith said. “In the second set, we started over hitting at times and playing back at the baseline too much at times, but overall I was pleased with how the boys competed.  And they get to play at state next week as well.”

The state tournament will be held in Lexington May 17-19.

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