Mercer Island may be a young team, but the seniors still remembered Bellevue’s tennis players taking a celebratory photo on the Islanders’ court after winning the KingCo title last year.

So the message trickled down from the upperclassmen: if it happens again this year, it will be us doing the celebrating.

In their last league match of the regular season, the Islanders locked up the KingCo crown with a 5-2 win over the Wolverines Thursday, Oct. 8 at Bellevue High School.

“Everyone was on the same page,” Islander coach Ryan Pang said. “If they didn’t understand at the beginning of the season, they understood at that point how big the Bellevue match was.”

Mercer Island swept Bellevue in the doubles matches and scored two singles wins in the victory. Ben Bethards and Caden Conder  defeated Lawrence Hwang and Peter Hwang 6-3, 6-1. Christian Anderson and Alex Banbury beat Jack Albrecht and Jackson Watson 6-0, 6-3, and Kevin Chen and Jonah Tang won over Tommy Lee and Yuki Asahara  6-1, 6-0.

Chris Elliott scored a singles win over Kyto Akagi 6-3, 6-3, and Jake Bethards beat Jack Podolsky 6-1, 6-1. Bellevue’s Theo McDonald beat Brandon Wong in three sets 2-6, 7-6 (0), 6-3. Zach Fleischman also scored a win for the Wolverines, defeating Nils Harder 6-1, 6-2.

A year ago, Mercer Island couldn’t register a singles victory, giving Bellevue the edge. But this year the Wolverines were without top player Hunter Egger, who was listed as injured for the match.

Pang said it might’ve made for a closer match, but still felt confident his team would come away with the KingCo banner.

“I think everyone understood they had to bring a lot of energy,” Pang said. “It was probably the one time the team was altogether focused on one goal. Everyone was really into it.”

Mercer Island will take on Issaquah at 3:45 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 15 at Issaquah High School. The 3A KingCo tennis tournament will take place Oct. 19-20 at MIHS.