Travis Mistry of Sabine Pass left no mystery as to how well he can play on the tennis court Thursday.

The freshman opened his historic appearance in the UIL 2A boys singles tournament at Texas A&M with a 6-0, 6-0 win over Benjamin Lewis of Celeste. Mistry then lost 6-0, 6-1 to Caleb Horne of Mason in the semifinal round, earning third place.

“I guess I was feeling a bit too confident,” Mistry said with a laugh. “I went into the second match a little too overconfident. … If I had gone in with a different mindset, the guy probably would have beaten me anyway. The guy was a very good player, but the score probably would have been a little closer.”

His coach, Kelsey Bates, said Mistry never got down on himself in either match.

“Several of the games he won was like 40-love,” she said, explaining Mistry’s first contest. “His other match, most of those games were 40-30. The one that he won, he won 40-love.”

Mistry, 15, a 16-under Champs division player in the U.S. Tennis Association, won the 2A Region III championship en route to becoming the first Sabine Pass tennis player to reach state. Bates could see the excitement in his face over making the final field of eight in 2A tennis.

Horne, a senior, will take on either Dylan Ging of Thrall and Kade McAdams of Seymour in Friday morning’s championship match. He comes from a school that had six semifinal entries across all 2A tennis divisions Thursday. The first-round result for a potential seventh entry in girls doubles had not yet been announced.

— I.C. Murrell