Lavery, Romeo reach final

LAGUNA NIGUEL “” Laguna Beach High’s Chris Lavery and Benito Romeo made it to the boys’ 18 doubles finals at the 11th annual Laguna Niguel Junior Open tennis tournament June 19.

Lavery, a senior-to-be, and Romeo, a junior-to-be, advanced to the final against Patrick Lipscomb and Matthew Miller of Irvine before narrowly falling, 7-6, 4-6 and 5-10 in the tiebreaker.

On the way to the final, Lavery and Romeo defeated brothers Joshua Barnard and Jacob Barnard, 1-6, 6-1, 10-7. Then, they beat top-seeded Kevin Law of Highland and Ryan Olson of Redlands, 6-2, 6-1.

Romeo and Lavery have been training this summer with Coach Jimmy Gleason, the girls’ tennis coach at Laguna Beach High.

Earlier this month, they helped the Breakers reach the CIF Southern Section Division IV title match, Laguna’s first CIF final in 26 years in boys’ tennis.

Lavery and Romeo were the No. 2 and No. 3 singles players on that team, respectively, and have become close friends and hitting partners.

They also played together at the ongoing 107th annual Southern California Junior Sectional Championships, held at Los Caballeros Sports Village in Fountain Valley. Lavery and Romeo advanced to the Round of 64 in boys’ 18 doubles before losing to top-seeded Lawrence Formentera of Colton and Mousheg Hovhannisyan of North Hollywood.