Mason Cisco of Vero Beach and the No. 1 player on the Vero Beach High School boys tennis team, recently had a strong showing at the PTT Universal Tennis tournament at The Boulevard finishing as the runner-up in the back-draw o the event.
Cisco played five matches in two days, winning three and losing two, the final match being a 6-4, 6-4 loss in the back-draw final to Youssef El Shafei of Egypt, who happened to be the grandson of Egypt’s greatest ever tennis player, Ismail El Shafei, who is one of only four players to beat Bjorn Borg at Wimbledon, which he did in the third round in 1974 en route to the quarterfinals. El Shafei came to the event with a group of Egyptian players who train with former Egyptian Davis Cupper and LSU standout Tamer El Sawy.
Cisco is now a junior at Vero Beach High School and has a 9.25 UTR rating.
Chase Perez Blanco, the tennis pro at Quail Valley and the reigning “King of the Hill” champion, also played the event and reached the semifinals of the main draw, losing to Hady El Kordy of Egypt 6-2, 6-3. Boulevard Club members James Bragg and Chris Dold also supported the event and accorded themselves well.
