DENVER | Since the first day of fall practice, Oct. 21 has been circled on the calendar for the Regis Jesuit boys tennis team.
The date of the Class 5A team championship match at the Denver Tennis Park loomed as a date of destiny, where the Raiders believed they would have a chance to defeat nemesis Cherry Creek to become state champions.
The march through the calendar finally ended Tuesday and all of Regis Jesuit's preparation paid off in a 4-2 victory courtesy of a singles sweep and No. 1 doubles victory that brought home the program's sixth all-time state championship.
"Since the season started, we've just been calling out that day through practices and every match we play; we had to be ready for October 21st," senior No. 2 singles player Clay Dickey said. "We had a point to prove and we did it."
Indeed, coach Laura Jones' Raiders were fueled by the disappointment of last season's 4-3 loss to the Bruins -- winner of 47 all-time state championships and undefeated since the Colorado High School Activities Association adopted the team dual format in the 2022 season -- and the fruits of development of seven new varsity players.
Six of Regis Jesuit's seven lines had won 5A individual state titles two days earlier -- those going to singles players in junior Alec Rodriguez-Fields (No. 1), Dickey (No. 2) and senior Adam Rydell (No. 3) and the doubles teams of junior Koops Lord and sophomore Will Larkin (No. 1), sophomore Reis Cherveny and junior Edward Samuelson (No. 2) and junior Beckett Martorella and sophomore Finn Carolan (No. 3) -- but the team championship carried a much heavier importance for all of the Raiders.
Cherry Creek took the advantage with the first two victories, as Sunand Bhandaram and Ryan Raleigh prevailed 7-5, 6-3 over Regis Jesuit's Connor and Daniel Hickey at No. 4 doubles and Adam Eikelberner and Kapil Bhandaram downed Cherveny and Samuelson 6-2, 6-4 in the No. 2 doubles match.
But Regis Jesuit's singles strength turned the tide, as Rodriguez-Fields -- now winner of two straight 5A individual No. 1 singles crowns -- finished an undefeated season with a 6-2, 6-2 defeat of Cherry Creek's Aidan Washer, which was followed by Rydel's 6-2, 7-5 win over Cherry Creek's Devan Shah at No. 3 singles.
Lord and Larkin kept the roll going with their 6-3, 6-4 defeat of Sam Migliaccio and Tyson Hardy at No. 1 doubles, which set things up for Dickey to try to end it if he could take his match with Jack Loehr.
Dickey breezed past Loehr in the individual championship match, but needed three sets to win this battle, which he did 6-0, 5-7, 6-2.
"That's how high school tennis is, it's just handling pressure as well as you can and that's what we did today," Dickey said.
Jones also took satisfaction in watching Dickey -- who was dubbed 'Clay All Day' for the lengthy matches he's played all the way back to his freshman season at No. 1 singles -- put the match to rest.
She was also pleased that Regis Jesuit's large group of young players grew up over the course of other season and performed their best when it was needed.
"We kept talking about 10/21 and what an important day it was going to be for us," Jones said. "We needed to get here and we needed to be ready for today. We got here and we were ready. I'm so proud of them."
It was especially satisfying given the opponent.
"We had a bunch of people come up to us at individual state and say 'please beat Creek,' so it was good we could get it done," Rodriguez-Fields said.