Upper St. Clair boys' tennis coach Ron Mercer always has been a man who's shown great confidence in his team.

A coach who has guided the Panthers to five consecutive WPIAL Class AAA team championships, he has earned the right to be a little boastful.

Stop me if you've heard this one before: Upper St. Clair won the WPIAL Class AAA boys' team tennis championship. Again. This season, it was capped by a 3-2 win against Shady Side Academy in the title match last Friday at the Lakevue Racquet Club in Valencia.

It is the fifth consecutive crown for the Panthers.

"Five years in a row is quite unusual so it's pretty good to be a part of," senior singles player Scott Yanek said.

What also has been unusual is the team's propensity for making it to the PIAA championship match but losing. Upper St. Clair has advanced to the PIAA title match each of the past four years but lost each time.

This year's tournament will finish this weekend. After a 4-1 win against Allderdice in the first round Tuesday, the Panthers advanced to play Radnor at 6:30 p.m. tomorrow at the Hershey Racquet Club. The semifinals and finals are Saturday, also in Hershey.

"We're just winging it now," Mercer said. "We thought we had it going into it last year. We're taking an underdog mentality [this season].

"We thought we'd win last year, but this year we're not putting too much pressure on ourselves. We'll go in as the underdog and see if that works."

Part of that mentality is borne out of the fact the Panthers were genuinely happy to win the WPIAL title this season. Replacing five starters from last season's team, the team entered the season viewing any possible PIAA success as icing on the cake.

"We tried to win WPIALs; we didn't even think about states," Mercer said. "We treat the state tournament as a separate tournament. WPIALs was really important to us."

The title run has now spanned an entire graduating class -- and then some. But Yanek said the feeling of winning a championship never gets old.

"Each one is better every time," Yanek said. "I only have started the past two years, so for me personally it's only two, but they're just as good as any other time. In fact, maybe it gets even better. It never gets old."

In the WPIAL title match, USC sophomore Ethan Kallick beat SSA's Josh Ferraccio, 6-4, 6-3, at second singles and Yanek defeated Ben Cohen, 7-5, 6-1, at third singles. The Panthers' third point came in the final match, second doubles. Sophomores Ryan Pearson and Harris Tucker beat Justin Hunt and Michael Anthony, 6-1, 6-1.

Junior Jay Jones is the team's top player, and junior Nick Navarre and senior Shivom Sinha the Panthers' first doubles pairing.