West High tennis continues to thrive under an Alaska coaching pioneer

The first year Alaska crowned a state high school tennis team champion under the Alaska School Activities Association was 2007. Since then, only two schools — West High and South — have claimed titles.

And for the most prolific program in the state, there has been one constant.

Bill Cotton, the West coach, is a pioneer of the sport in the state, presiding over eight state championships.

“South and West are the only teams that have ever won the state title,” Cotton said. “Since 2004 when I started, we’ve won 15 out of 18 conference championships.”

After South won it all in 2017, the Eagles took state in 2018. In 2019, the two schools were co-state champions after finishing with 105 points a piece by the end of the tournament.

Even though there was no team champion crowned in 2020, the Eagles had the most top-three individual finishers that year with five and the next closest schools were South and Lathrop tied with three apiece.

In 2021, the Eagles were co-Cook Inlet Conference champions with South because both teams finished 11-1. West went on to take the state title.

“He’s the best coach in the state in my opinion,” junior Will Sedwick said. “I love winning and I love playing tennis for West.”

While high school tennis in Alaska has been around since the 1980s, state tournaments didn’t exist on an official level until 2007. West won the first before going on to claim eight of the next 13 state tournaments through 2021. South has won six.

Cotton was one of the early pioneers and architects of the state tournament for Alaska high school tennis.

“When I got here I started what was called the invitational, which was in essence a state title,” Cotton said.

West attracts many of the city’s best young tennis players and keeps a steady pipeline of talent flowing through the program by working with players of all skill levels as young as middle-school age.

“We never cut anybody,” Cotton said. “We encourage everybody to get out and play, and we have players that start off in ninth grade that have never played or have played a little bit but by the time they’re juniors and seniors, they’re playing varsity matches.”

Cotton is a retired attorney and during his career practicing law, he ran the Alaska Judicial Council for a dozen years, the Alaska Legal Services Pro Bono Program and an worked as an administrative law judge for just over a decade. He also ran Anchorage Community Theater for four years.

Cotton has even retired from coaching school tennis a couple of times over the years. He started by coaching at West for 10 years. He spent two years at Dimond from 2014-2015 where the Lynx broke the Eagles’ consecutive conference title win streak in just his first year with the program. He returned to West, where he has been the last five years.

Sedwick competes in mixed doubles exclusively and finished third in the state tournament last year in that format alongside his doubles partner, Ava Smith.

“I’m coming back hoping to get second and maybe win it all,” Sedwick said.

Both of his older brothers played at West. His brother, Robbie, who graduated this past spring, was a part of four state title-winning teams, and was the boys singles runner-up in 2018.

Senior Eva Lief is coming off winning back-to-back doubles titles in 2020 and 2021 and is looking to make it a third year in a row to cap off her final season.

Her mindset heading into the season is to keep the streak of consecutive championships alive and have fun while doing it.

Lief enjoys playing a team sport that also has a strong individual component.

“For tennis I think it’s definitely different because it’s a team sport but it’s mostly just you and maybe another person out there,” Lief said. “It’s not like football where there’s a lot of people all the time. There’s a lot of pressure.”

But having a partner and friend to play with helps relieve some of that pressure.

Lief has a “very carefree dynamic” with her doubles partner and fellow reigning state champion, Antonia Yu.

“Antonia is one of my best friends so it’s pretty nice because on the court we can laugh together and off the court we can go hang out later,” Lief said.

The two share some of the same classes and often hang out outside of school and after practices.

“It makes it a lot easier to play and I feel like I play a lot better with someone I really like,” she said.

She says repeating as champions is on the forefront of both of their minds but there might be a possibly that the dynamic duo breaks up this year.

Cotton may play Yu in singles since she and Lief are his two best players and two-time defending girls single state champion Athena Clendaniel and two-time state runner-up Sophie Green graduated in the spring.

“I’m considering doubles and singles with the two of them,” Cotton said. “They’re my best two players and it’s hard to put the best two in just one division.”

He says those types of decisions are “always the hardest’' but his job as a head coach is to put his players in the best position to maximize potential to earn points as a team.

“I want her to play with me but I’m a little selfish that way,” Lief said. “If she has to play singles then I’m happy for her that way too.”

Even though they lost both Clendaniel and Green as well as two-time boys single state champion Charlie Rush to graduation, Cotton is confident in this year’s team and their ability to continue their reign of dominance.

“We’ve got a good team again,” Cotton said.