The Non-Public, North Jersey Tournament is a crucible of elite tennis talent, featuring three top-five programs in the NJ.com Top 20.
In Tuesday’s quarterfinal round matchup in Montclair, fifth-seeded Bergen Catholic, No. 16 in the NJ.com Top 20, defeated fourth-seeded (No. 11) Montclair Kimberley, 3-2.
-
5/27 - 3:30 PM Boys Tennis Final Bergen Catholic 3 Montclair Kimberley 2
The win came down to a tiebreaker in the second-doubles match between Justin Choi and Daniel Calianese of Bergen Catholic and Nikhil Shah and Scott Skipper of Montclair Kimberley.
“In the first set, we started off pretty strong going up 3-0. Then we weren’t feeling well and [Montclair Kimberley] kind of got to us,” said Calianese. “We dropped four-straight games to go down. Then we exchanged games and were down 5-4. At one point, it was a set point and then we kind of just battled together and won. We battled back to win three straight games to win the first set, 7-5.”
During that first set, Calianese and Choi each began to feel lightheaded and unwell. The duo consulted head coach Steven Park, who motivated them to keep battling through the adversity.
“He just kind of worked us through it and it definitely helped us,” Choi said. “Like Daniel said, we both weren’t feeling too good, but we both managed it out and took it at the end.”
Shah and Skipper fought back in the second set to take the victory, 6-3, and send the match to a tiebreaker.
At this point in the match, Bergen Catholic already took wins at third-singles and first-doubles. Montclair Kimberley held the advantage at first- and second-singles as the second-doubles match went to a tiebreaker.
Coach Park brought the duo together before the tiebreaker began to keep them in the right mindset.
“He basically told us not to double fault, which I think I definitely did [in the beginning],” Choi said. “He definitely helped us through [the tiebreaker] and it was a tough one. We dropped the first two points, but we somehow took the W at the end and it was really good.”
Calianese said they had played in a lot of tiebreakers this season, but this was “the most important tiebreaker that we ever played.”
“As a senior, I knew that this could be my final match, but I didn’t want to end it on a loss like that,” he said.
The bounce-back win for the second-doubles pair was gutsy, as Park explained. He recognized the tough competition on the other end of the court and told the boys to keep pushing.
“It’s not like it was a cakewalk for them, so they had to fight for it,” Park said. “I’m very happy for them. They had that similar situation at the County Tournament, but it went in their favor and I think that loss helped them prepare for this type of match again.”
Choi and Calianese both played at second-doubles in the semifinal round of the Bergen County Tournament, where they fell to Dwight-Englewood. Bergen Catholic finished in third place behind Dwight-Englewood.
Earlier in the match, Bergen Catholic’s Leonardo Park defeated Montclair Kimberley’s Nicholas Wolf 6-0, 6-1 at third-singles. Bergen Catholic also took the first-doubles match as Brian Song and Daniel Song downed Alejandro Crespo and Thomas Irwin 6-0, 6-2.
Wolf moved into the third-singles spot as Camron Ganchi, the main second-singles player for Montclair Kimberley, did not play in the quarterfinal match.
Assistant coach Bill Wing, who took over the coaching duties for head coach Val Azzoli temporarily this season, said the team has played a lot of tough opponents in its season and was ready to take on Bergen Catholic.
“Our league is so strong. Obviously we’ve played Newark [Academy] three times already and we’ve played Millburn three times,” Wing said. “We played a pretty good out-of-season schedule, too. We played Chatham and some other teams. We played in the Delbarton tournament. We’ve had good competition and we know they’re a good team and we just look forward to playing them.”
Montclair Kimberley toughed out impressive wins with Sean Wang taking the win over Steven Komoto 6-3, 6-4 in first-singles and Santos Garner defeating Christian Choi at second-singles.
Bergen Catholic also got some redemption as most of the players from last season’s 5-0 loss in the quarterfinal round of the Non-Public, North Jersey Tournament to Montclair Kimberley were back this season.
Park said coaching this season’s boys tennis team has been fun as the team’s togetherness has stuck out to him.
“What made them fun this year is they really blended as a team. Our top player this year is a transfer and because of the camaraderie our team has it didn’t even seem like he was an outsider playing on our team,” Park said. “The one great point about this year is that because of injuries last year we took a lot of 2-3 losses. This year the tide has turned where we either win 3-2 or 4-1.”
Bergen Catholic will play top-seeded (No. 2) Newark Academy in the semifinal round of the Non-Public, North Jersey Tournament on Thursday.
Anthony Gabbianelli can be reached atagabbianelli@njadvancemedia.com.
The N.J. High School Sports newsletter is now appearing in mailboxes 5 days a week.Sign up now! Follow us on social:Facebook|Instagram|X (formerly Twitter)