Men’s Tennis Claims Co-Conference Championship in Regular Season Finale

Water was successfully dumped on Head Coach Evan Parry as he celebrated with his team on Tuesday afternoon after a 9-0 sweep against the Orange Coast College Pirates. The Tigers, who claimed the Orange Empire Conference (OEC) Co-Championship after dominating rival Irvine Valley last week, earned themselves a proper celebration after completing regular season play.

"I don't think the magnitude of this championship has hit me yet," said Parry. "It will take me a little bit of time to settle in."

The last time the Tigers won an OEC Championship was back in 2018, ending a four year drought. With the victory, the Tigers will host the first round of the Southern California Regionals at home and likely be a top three seed after running through quality regional opponents all season.

"We sat down this year in August and again in January and said our number one goal was to win a conference championship. We are pretty excited."

Riverside accomplished this by sweeping Orange Coast with easy. The longest match was a three-set thriller featuring freshman Enricco Recchia. After dropping the first set 3-6, he roared back to take the second set, 6-3, and completed a third-set tiebreaker at 11-9.

Sophomore duo Carlos Rullan and Rafael Rullan, who are the top-seeded doubles team in the upcoming OEC Championships, cruised to an 8-2 win. They won their respected singles matches in two sets as well.

Freshman Emilio Real won his singles match, 6-0, 6-2, as the second singles player, while freshman Raphael Delente and Austin Harvill completed two-set wins.

"It is amazing to see this character of this team grow and how much they love each other. They are happy for one another and it made it that much more enjoyable."

Riverside finishes the regular season 12-2 with a 6-1 conference clip. They will enter into the OEC Singles and Doubles tournament starting on Thursday, April 6 on the road.