Sports > November 13, 2008

By Phillip Brame | Staff writer

The Wake Forest men’s tennis program achieved a tremendous milestone over the weekend as senior Cory Parr and junior Steven Forman won the ITA National Indoor Championships to capture the first National Championship in the program’s history.

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(Photo courtsey of Media Relations)

The Indoor Championships brought together 32 of the top men’s singles players and 16 of the top men’s doubles teams from around the country. Forman and Parr were awarded the No.1 seed but as Wake Forest Head Tennis Coach Jeff Zinn noted, every match at this level of play was extremely difficult.

“This tournament is a culmination of the fall tennis season and it is the toughest tournament to get into in college tennis,” Zinn said.

Once the Deacons arrived in Virginia and saw the draw, both were confident of advancing deep into the tournament.

“When I saw the draw I told Steve that I thought we had a really good chance of getting into the later rounds,” Parr said.

In their first match, they defeated the team of Jason Jung and Mike Sroczynski from the University of Michigan, 8-5. They followed that up with an 8-6 quarterfinal victory over Geoff Chizever and Pedro Zerbini of University of California-Berkeley.

As Forman explained, the combination of the pro set format for the first two rounds as well as the Cal team’s style of play made for one of their tougher matches of the weekend.

“It was a weird match because they are very unorthodox and we had several early chances to get up on them,” Forman said. “They almost broke us late to go up a break and we really had to pull together to close it out.”

In the semifinals, the scoring format switched from an eight-game pro-set to best of three tiebreak sets. In Zinn’s mind, the pro set format provided a challenge for Parr and Forman in the early rounds.

“For us it helps the longer we play,” Zinn said. “We play a high percentage game and the longer we play we start to break down the other team’s weaknesses. A pro set is basically a crapshoot because it can change so quickly.”

In their semifinal match against Arnau Brugues and Phil Stevens of Tulsa, Parr and Forman took a tight first set, and then pulled away in the second set, winning 7-6(3), 6-2.

The championship match against Robert Farah and Steve Johnson of Southern Cal would prove to be their toughest yet against one player with a National Championship to his credit.

Farah partnered with another Trojan in the NCAA Tournament to capture the National Championship during the spring season. There would be no repeat of past success for Farah as the Deacon doubles team squeezed out two tiebreak wins to take the match 7-6(3), 7-6(5). As Parr explained, the duo’s success has been the result of match experience through the highs and lows of collegiate tennis.

“Steve and I have faced it all,” Parr said. “Last year in the NCAA quarters we had match point and lost. This year at regionals we had match point in the match we lost. I think we’re at the point where nothing shocks us anymore.”

Zinn also attributed the success of his doubles team to their experience as well as the way in which their different games come together to form a better team.

“There’s two main ingredients to a good doubles team,” Zinn said. “One is camaraderie and how well they get along on the court. The other is that you want to have a power player (Forman) and a conservative player (Parr).”

Parr, who is the No. 24 singles player in the nation, also qualified for the National Indoor Championships singles draw by reaching the finals of the ITA Mideast Regional Championships last month.

In his first match against Chris Clayton of Harvard, Parr won a tight first set, and then blew Clayton away in the second set, winning 6-4, 6-0. However, in his next match, he faced the No. 1 player in the country, Oleksandr Nedovyesov of Oklahoma State, and was defeated 6-4, 6-2.

The ITA Indoor Championship was the last event of the fall season for the men’s tennis team. The Demon Deacons begin dual match play on Jan. 24. As Zinn looks ahead to the spring season he feels the success of Parr and Forman will propel his team to contend in the ACC.

“Our doubles is our strength, and we’re going to feel very confident that after our doubles we’re going to be ahead 1-0 going into singles,” Zinn said.