BHHS Boys Tennis Routs Culver City

In the latter stages of Thursday's varsity tennis match, a Culver City High player could be heard telling a teammate "We don't belong in the same league as them."

A quick glance at the scoresheet would suggest the same: Beverly Hills 16, Culver City 2.

The Normans dominated the Ocean League meeting on their own courts, sweeping all nine doubles sets and losing just four games in the process.

Beverly Hills likely would have swept in singles as well but coach Mike Margolin subbed out his two top players after the first rotation. Still, the Normans posted an easy win over their archrivals, alleviating some of the sting from a 10-8 home loss to Santa Monica on March 31.

"That score was a little bit deceiving because they didn't have their best player [Cristobal Rivera]," Margolin said of the Samo match. "We kept it close but they are clearly the team to beat this year. The next time we play it'll be at their place so we'll have our hands full."

The Normans (4-7 overall, 2-1 in league) certainly had no trouble with Culver City in the teams' first meeting of the season. Beverly Hills won the first nine sets in the round robin format as its No. 1 player Sam Farzani sat out the second and third rotations.

Beverly Hills is in rebuilding mode after losing one of the top junior players in the nation, Daniel Ho, to graduation. Ho is now at Stanford and the Normans are left trying to fill his void.

"You don't lose a player of his caliber and not feel it," said Margolin, now in his 12th year at BHHS. "He's hard to replace."

Beverly Hills is ranked ninth in the latest Southern Section Division 2 poll. Earlier this week the Normans lost 11-7 to powerhouse Harvard-Westlake, which is ranked fourth in Division 1.

"It's hard to predict how we'll do in the playoffs because we haven't played most of the teams in our division," Margolin said. "Hopefully, we'll be able to make a run at it."

Farzani will partner with Jonathan Jason in the CIF doubles division at the Ojai Tournament later this month, while Donovan Suh, Drew Freeman and Eric Busi will play singles matches.

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