GAMES
RANKINGS
Foster advanced to the State Semis
First-Time Champions: Westlake Boys, Hebron Girls Claim UIL Water Polo State Titles
SAN ANTONIO — Two programs that had never hoisted a water polo state trophy left Josh Davis Natatorium with one Saturday.
Austin Westlake ran away from Boerne Champion 15-8 for the UIL boys championship, and Lewisville Hebron survived a six-tie thriller against Clute Brazoswood, 10-8, for the girls title. Both are first-time champions in a sport the UIL has sanctioned only since 2022, and both finished the season with a single loss or none at all between them: Westlake 31-1, Hebron a perfect 28-0.
For the Houston area, the weekend ended one short. Two-time defending boys champion Clear Creek fell in Friday's semifinal, and Brazoswood — the 2024 girls champion making its fifth straight state trip — came within a goal of forcing a fourth-quarter tie before Hebron closed it out.
Boys: Westlake 15, Boerne Champion 8
Westlake scored the first eight goals of the championship game and never gave Boerne Champion a way back in.
The Chaparrals shut out Champion for an entire half. The Chargers did not find the net until 4:30 remained in the third quarter, and by then the game was decided. Senior Luke Welton scored six goals and was named game MVP; sophomore Zephyr Gates added four. Goalkeeper Silas Chamas turned away chance after chance, and head coach Darci Carruthers called it the best defensive effort her team had played all season.
The title comes in just the fourth season Westlake has fielded a water polo team. The Chaps finish 31-1, ranked No. 4 in the country by MaxPreps, and they reached the final by beating Lewisville Hebron 16-9 on Friday — a game that was tied 3-3 after one quarter before Westlake pulled away. Welton had four goals and four assists in the semifinal; Laird Green scored three.
Boerne Champion, in its fifth straight state tournament, is still chasing its first championship. The Chargers earned their shot by knocking off two-time defending champion League City Clear Creek 17-12 in the semifinals, avenging a one-goal loss to the Wildcats in August and a 17-12 loss at last year's state tournament. Junior Julius Hoxhaj, the reigning Express-News Boys Player of the Year, scored six in the semifinal and four more in the final despite constant double-teams. Grant Perkins added three goals in the championship game, and goalkeeper Jackson Hankins made 13 saves against Clear Creek.
Champion coach Scott Slay did not sugarcoat the final — the Chargers had 28 shots to Westlake's 33, several of them off the crossbar — but he called Westlake one of the best teams he has seen in 25 years.
Girls: Hebron 10, Brazoswood 8
The girls final was everything the boys final was not: tight, physical and in doubt until the last two minutes.
Brazoswood struck 24 seconds in on a Therese Braun goal, and from there the two teams traded punches. It was 3-3 after one quarter and 4-4 at halftime. Brazoswood erased three one-goal deficits in the third quarter alone, with Hope Kadlecik, Larissa Bracken and Braun each answering a Hebron score. Six times the game was tied. Neither team ever led by more than two.
Hebron freshman Ryann Renfroe finally broke it. Her goal with 1:12 left in the third put the Hawks up 8-7, and she scored again with 4:32 to play to make it 9-7. Bracken pulled Brazoswood back within one at 9-8 with 4:15 left, but sophomore Lauren Waggoner's insurance goal at 2:41 and a shutdown final four minutes from the Hebron defense sealed it.
Senior goalkeeper Amber Cho made 13 saves and was named championship game MVP. Sophomore Abi Cho and Renfroe each scored three. Hebron, the No. 1 team in the MaxPreps national rankings, finishes 28-0 and topped 400 goals on the season. The Hawks had beaten Brazoswood twice in August, 8-6 and 9-5, and Amber Cho said getting the Buccaneers a third time — with a state title on the line — made this one special.
Hebron reached the final by routing San Antonio Clark 25-15 on Friday, the Cougars' first state tournament appearance.
Brazoswood (32-3), ranked No. 6 nationally, was chasing its second title after winning it all in 2024. Larissa Bracken led the Buccaneers with three goals in the final after an eight-goal semifinal against Richmond Foster, which Brazoswood won 15-11 behind seven unanswered third-quarter goals. Goalkeeper Claire Crisp had 13 saves against Foster and seven in the final. Coach Robert Brown's Bucs have now played in all five UIL girls state tournaments.
Foster, the other Houston-area semifinalist, bows out after its trip to San Antonio.
Memorial wins State... Again
TITLE CHASERS: Memorial Team Tennis wins State Gold
SAN ANTONIO — The Memorial Mustangs are state champions again, and this time they had to go through the two best programs in Texas to do it.
Memorial knocked off Southlake Carroll 10-7 in the Class 6A final Thursday at Blossom Tennis Center, capping a two-day run through the UIL Team Tennis State Tournament that also included a 10-9 semifinal upset of five-time state champion Round Rock Westwood. It is the third team tennis state title in program history for the Mustangs, who also won it all in 2017 and 2019.
The Mustangs finish the fall 18-1. The lone blemish? A season-opening loss to Westwood — a team Memorial would not see again until the state semifinals. Eighteen straight wins later, head coach Brian Mandell and assistant J.P. Bonilla had their revenge and a spot in the final.
Doubles set the tone
Memorial came out of the doubles round with a 4-3 lead, and it was the girls who did the heavy lifting. Lucy Chung and Katherine Varady opened with a 6-3, 6-4 win at the top line. Zoe Smith and Addison Womac rolled 6-1, 6-0, and Grace Martin and Celeste Hoang were nearly as dominant at 6-0, 6-1. On the boys' side, Yosef Elyashkevich and Nicholas Du handled Carroll's Rushil Rajpal and Francesco Poggi 6-4, 6-2.
Girls singles slam the door, boys singles finish it
The Memorial girls were close to untouchable in singles. Chung won 6-3, 6-3. Martin won 6-3, 6-2. Smith won 6-0, 6-3. Womac closed hers out 6-4, 6-2. Four more points, and the Mustangs were on the doorstep.
The clinching points came the hard way. Joowon Kim dropped his first set 4-6, then stormed back 6-2 and took the match tiebreaker 10-3. Aiden Yan did the same — down 3-6, back 6-3, and a 10-6 tiebreaker that gave Memorial its 10th point and the championship.
The road to San Antonio
The Mustangs did not drop a single match in the first three rounds of the playoffs, blanking Pasadena Dobie 19-0, Barbers Hill 11-0 and Pearland Dawson 10-0. They outlasted Austin Vandegrift 10-7 in the regional semifinal, then beat Fort Bend Clements 10-5 for the regional title and a return trip to state.
In San Antonio, the bracket was loaded. Westwood came in 19-0. The Woodlands, the defending 6A champion, was 16-0 before Southlake Carroll took the Highlanders down 10-8 in the other semifinal. Carroll arrived in the final at 20-1. Memorial beat two of them in two days.
Three state titles in a decade. Eighteen wins in a row. A roster that swept the girls' side of the final and came from behind twice on the boys' side to close it out. In Spring Branch, the Mustangs have built a tennis dynasty — and this group just added the biggest trophy yet.
Program notes: Memorial's three team tennis state championships (2017, 2019, 2026) all came under the UIL's top classification. The 2026 title is the first under coach Brian Mandell.