Fresh off a disappointing loss in the state sectional finals, Montclair juniors Tylan Ozkuzey, Max Korenbaum and Teddy Ogden showed that they will be a force to deal with in 2024.
After the Mounties lost to Bergen Tech, 4-1, in the North 1 Group 4 state final on June 5, Ozkuzey, the No. 1 singles player for Montclair High School, made it all the way to the state individual semifinals before falling on June 14.
The Mounties doubles team of Korenbaum and Ogden reached the third round before being ousted in a three-set match to East Brunswick’s Jayden He and Sidd Ramaswamy, 6-4, 4-6, 10-8.
Montclair head coach Guy Rabner said he was not surprised by the Korenbaum-Ogden team’s success.
“They played first doubles together most of the season, so they know one another well,” Rabner said. “They have competed well against very good teams all year so, no, I wasn’t surprised at all.”
Rabner said he believed that Ozkuzey had the stuff for the state individual run and that running the gauntlet of this postseason tournament will only help him in 2024.
“I think he already had the confidence and game before he played the tournament, but beating players of this quality tells him there is no match next year he can’t win and will only get hungrier to have a great season next year,” Rabner said. “He has the work ethic, drive and desire and nothing will surprise me next year. His jump to this level this year has surprised even me but now the sky is clearly the limit.”
In the state individual competition, Ozkuzey upset some top singles players. He had five victories and ended with a loss to Mendham’s Liam Kilmer, 6-2, 6-3. Kilmer would go on to win the state individual tournament title.
The Mounties’ first singles player said that the key for the run of victories was a “high percentage of first serves in play and dictate play with mostly my forehand.”
“I tried to stay in control of every point and pressure my opponents every shot,” the Montclair junior said. “I played a very controlled offensive game and not try to end points too quickly but play each point at the pace I want.”
Ozkuzeyand Kilmer are friends, so they are very familiar with each other’s game. “I faced him earlier in the season, but I got injured early in that match, so I had to withdraw midway through,” Ozkuzey said.
The semifinal was supposed to happen on June 14 at Mercer County Park in West Windsor, but the inclement weather sent it inside and in turn changed Ozkuzey’s tactics. The Mounties junior’s plan was to “dictate play,” but that sort of went out the window with rainy conditions.
“The match unfortunately got moved indoors due to rain, which altered my strategy a bit, and I feel I wasn’t able to find my rhythm and adjust to the indoor conditions,” Ozkuzey said. “He was able to utilize the indoor conditions to his advantage.”
Rabner said the biggest victory of the five-match run was in the fourth round, where the Mountie defeated Princeton Day’s Heyang Li, 6-1, 1-6, 10-6. Li was considered one of the favorites to win the state individual title.
“I think beating Li, who was both undefeated and the odds-on favorite to win the tournament, in the round of 16 was the big breakthrough,” Rabner said. “He really wanted to get a shot at [Li] and clearly had the ability to both compete and the confidence and fortitude to close out the match. After that he felt like he could beat anyone and could win the tournament.”
Ozkuzey said that his dominating 6-1, 6-0 triumph over Ridgewood’s Niko Martirossian in the third round had given him the confidence to take on Li in the fourth round. “After I won my third-round match,” Ozkuzey said, “I knew that if I could keep up my momentum as I had in the previous three matches, that I could have a shot to win the tournament.”
The Montclair doubles team of Korenbaum and Ogden defeated Manasquan’s Liam Hoverter and Thomas Watson, 6-1, 6-3 on June 10 in the first round then took care of Lenape’s team of Kunal Gupta and Nikhil Venkatachalapathy, 6-3, 7-5 in the second round on June 11. “The key for them has always been consistency and execution and when they have that going then they have a chance to compete with and potentially beat anyone,” Rabner said.
The Montclair team season came to an end on June 5 like it did last season, with a loss to Bergen Tech in the North 1 Group 4 sectional final, 4-1. Ozkuzey had the lone win for the Mounties with a 6-3, 6-1 victory over Bergen Tech’s Udbhav Devarakonda.
Despite the loss to Bergen Tech, Rabner believes that his team, which has most of its starters back for 2024, picked up experience in this season’s state title loss to Bergen Tech.
“They learned that they absolutely are right there in their level and with a little more dedication to their game and learning how to better close out a match that they can be state champs next year,” the Montclair head coach said.