So Cal tennis team waits to begin drive for five

Membership has its privileges, especially when it comes to being part of a championship team.

Southern California has won four consecutive titles at the USTA 18-under National Team Championship, but local standouts Ryan Thacher (Harvard-Westlake of Studio City graduate/Stanford) and the Thousand Oaks trio of Denis Lin, Kyle McMorrow (Washington) and JT Sundling had to wait an extra day to begin the team's pursuit of a fifth straight crown at Atkins Tennis Center in Urbana, Ill.

With only 15 teams qualifying for the event -- formerly known as the Junior Davis Cup -- Southern California was awarded a first-round bye Saturday and will put its 16-match tournament winning streak on the line at 6 a.m. PDT Sunday in a quarterfinal showdown with Mid-Atlantic, a 6-1 winner over Pacific Northwest.

Southern California defeated Southern 4-3 in last year's 4 1/2-hour final, its fourth consecutive win over the South since a 5-2 setback in the 2003 championship.

Steve Johnson (Orange High), a USC signee, is seeking his fourth consecutive 18-under national team title. Thacher and Sundling are both looking for their third championship, while Lin and McMorrow are making their debuts for Southern California, which is coached by Mountain Gate Junior Tennis Academy's Barry Horowitz.

Andre Dome (Arroyo Grande High/Cal Poly) and Fabian Matthews (Corona del Mar/UC Irvine) round out the Southern California roster, which might boast the deepest collection of doubles talent during the section's five-year run. The teams play six singles matches -- each worth a point -- and three doubles pro-sets, with the first team to win two awarded the point.

Southern California could face Southern for the third consecutive year in the championship match -- scheduled for Tuesday -- as the sections are the tournament's top two seeds. Southern California won 6-1 in the 2006 final, which followed a pair of 6-1 victories over Texas in 2004 and '05.