Sports

2011 Top Sports Story No. 8: Three titles in one, busy day for Ujkic

GARRET MEADE FILE PHOTO | On a busy Saturday in August, Chris Ujkic won three titles in the Bob Wall Memorial Tennis Tournament, bringing his Bob Wall title count to 15.

Three titles in one day. Talk about putting in a full day’s play.

It’s hard to beat that, just as it has been hard for anyone to beat Chris Ujkic.

The former Mattituck High School and Sacred Heart University standout was his dominant self in the Bob Wall Memorial Tennis Tournament this past summer. On one Saturday at Tasker Park in Peconic, he captured three tournament titles.

Ujkic defeated his former Mattituck teammate, Matt Brisotti, in the men’s singles final, 6-3, 6-2, for the third year in a row; teamed up with Kieran Corcoran to repeat as the men’s doubles champions, 6-4, 6-2, over Brisotti and Chris Garner; and joined a new mixed doubles partner, Liz Lurie, to defeat Bob Lum and Wen Hu, 6-0, 6-3.

It would have been understandable if the Brisotti-Ujkic match gave spectators a sense of déjà vu all over again. Not only was it the third year in a row they faced each other in the final but, by Brisotti’s conservative estimate, the former high school teammates and childhood neighbors have played “thousands” of sets against one another over the years. They know each other’s games inside out. That made for a spirited final of dueling, left-handed, topspin forehands, and plenty of side-to-side action. As he has in capturing five consecutive men’s singles titles, Ujkic’s quickness and heady shot-making repertoire proved decisive.

And if Ujkic’s five straight men’s singles titles aren’t enough, how about six straight men’s doubles titles, which is how many he and Corcoran have won since 2006? And it seems likely that their partnership will endure, especially now that Ujkic has taken a post-graduate business development position with Corcoran’s New York City law firm.

Ujkic’s partnership with Lurie may be embryonic by comparison, but they were no less dominant in their straight-set victory over Hu and Lum. Ujkic and Lurie won the first set at love and prevailed in the second, 6-3, even though Lum made a game effort after turning his ankle and tumbling to the court midway through the second set.

With his mixed doubles victory, Ujkic raised to 15 the total number of titles he has won since he was a 17-year-old high school student in 2006. And with no signs of slowing down at age 22, don’t bet against him winning 15 more.