The first day of the Region III-5A tennis tournament offered little surprises, but brought anticipation for some really competitive semifinal matches.

The top four seeds in each division advanced to the semifinals, which will start at 8:30 a.m. Wednesday at the south campus at Deer Park. The finals for all divisions will be at around 11:30 a.m. for a bid for the state tournament next weekend.

In boys singles, top-seeded Justin Brooks of Cypress Creek made it to the semifinals with wins over Dulles’ Joe Hill (6-2, 6-3) and Pearland’s Daniel Hernandez (6-0, 6-4). He will face No. 4 seed Jose Martinez of Westside, who beat La Porte’s C.J. Martin (6-1, 6-1) and Memorial’s Adam Putterman (7-6, 6-3).

In the other semifinal, third-seeded Beau Bernstein of Fort Bend Austin will face Justin Chang from Memorial. Bernstein advanced past Bellaire’s Alex Stoupine in two sets (6-1, 6-0) and looked well in his two-set win over David Heckler of Strake Jesuit.

“Beau has been playing well lately,” Austin coach Shawn Moore said. “He’s on top of his game right now.”

Austin also had success in boys doubles, as No. 2 seed Ambrish Vasudevan and Shariq Khan advance to the semifinals with a tough win against Austin Harper and Dave Hoffman of Langham Creek. The Bulldogs duo won 6-4, 7-6.

Khan and Vasudevan will face Sam Barnes and Alex Ishikawa of Cinco Ranch in the semis, who eliminated teams from Clear Creek and Kingwood.

“Cinco’s been playing well lately,” Moore said. “It’s going to be tough.”

The other semifinal will have the top seed double’s team, Robert Voss and Chris Hoffman from Clear Lake, against Tim Kuo and John Kim of Katy Taylor.

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