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Perhaps it鈥檚 Conway鈥檚 turn.

The girls Class 5A dual team state champion has come from Horry County the last four seasons.

Conway would like to make it five and the Tigers could be in position to make it happen.

鈥淲e鈥檙e hoping to make it a fifth year this region gets the 5A state championship,鈥� said Conway coach Patrick Howle. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 our goal.鈥�

Socastee and Carolina Forest have alternated as state champions the last four years. The Braves won it in 2020 and 2022. Carolina Forest won in 2021 and is the defending champion, having won again in 2023.

Carolina Forest beat Conway 4-2 in a hard-fought Lower State championship match last fall.

鈥淚t shows how strong the tennis has been in this area for a number of years,鈥� Howle said.

Tennis is typically strong in resort communities like the Grand Strand, Hilton Head and Charleston.

It certainly is with Conway. The team is powerful, featuring South Carolina Gamecocks commit Anna Claire Roof and eighth-grade five-star phenom Emery Combs.

鈥淲e鈥檝e just had a core group of kids that kind of started early,鈥� Howle said. 鈥淚 don鈥檛 have any key factors. 鈥淚t鈥檚 just that we鈥檝e had some tennis families in the area that started the girls young.鈥�

They also got to start playing high school tennis two years before actually enrolling in high school. The South Carolina High School League allows seventh- and eighth graders to play non-contact high school sports.

鈥淢ost of these girls have been with me since the seventh grade,鈥� Howle said. 鈥淲e鈥檝e been together a long time.鈥�

Roof is at the top level, having signed with a power-4 school.

鈥淪he comes from an athletic family,鈥� Howle said. 鈥溾�hat really helps a lot. She鈥檚 a great player and has been playing a long time.鈥�

Combs is steadily piling up achievements. She just won a big junior tournament last weekend in Miami. And that is leading to another opportunity.聽

鈥淣ow she gets to go to France and play in a tournament and compete with players from around the world,鈥� Howle said.

The latest realignment brought Myrtle Beach and North Myrtle Beach into what is now being billed as the 鈥淏each Region.鈥�

Conway compiled a 17-1 record in the regular season with the only loss being to Myrtle Beach. Those teams split their region matches but Conway got the No. 1 seed based on a tiebreaker of games won.

There was a changing of the guard in the region. Conway dominated Carolina Forest and Socastee.

The matches between Conway and Myrtle Beach were both decided 4-3.

鈥淭hey were real good matches,鈥� Howle said. 鈥淚t was good competition, and all of these girls are good friends.鈥澛�

Sometimes they鈥檙e even teammates.聽

Two years ago, Roof and former Carolina Forest star Olivia Bull teamed up to win the USTA Southern Girls 16s doubles championship. Bull, who is now a senior at Connections Academy, a virtual charter school, has committed to College of Charleston.

The Tigers now await the SCHSL state playoff pairings. The state playoffs begin next Thursday, Oct. 31, for both Division I and Division II of Class 5A. The top four seeds in both the Lower State and Upper State receive first-round byes. The second round is Nov. 5.

鈥淲e鈥檒l see where we are when the pairings come out,鈥� Howle said. 鈥淗opefully we鈥檒l get a bye in the first round.鈥澛�

Whether they get a bye or not, the Tigers will be ready and they likely have a built-in 2-0 advantage when they step on the court. Roof and Combs have combined to win every set they have played. None of those sets have been close. Two other wins in either singles or doubles means victory.聽

鈥淲e like our chances,鈥� Howle said.