Francis W. Parker

Francis Parker student-athletes uphold a tradition of excellence on and off the field. Pictured here are (front row, from left) Ryan Saltzman, Zach Dookeran, Mike Van Pelt, T.C. Eley, Aon Hasnain, Jonny Levin and Asad Hasnain; (back row, from left) Allie Lopez, Catherine Rioux, Blair Fischer, Elizabeth Epstein and Elena Cohen.
(John J. Kim/Sun-Times)

A legacy of individual, team titles

February 10, 2009 BY TINA AKOURIS takouris@suntimes.com

Font Size

Bookmark

Black Text

White Text

TOP SPORTS MOMENTS

Back-to-back titles

1 Senior Elizabeth Epstein defeated Hinsdale Central's Nida Hamilton 6-4, 6-4 to win her second consecutive girls state tennis title in 2008, ending her high school career with a 106-4 record. Epstein, who has played in many national tournaments and ended 2007 with a No. 1 national ranking among girls 18s, will continue her tennis career at Yale.

Double the fun

2 In 2003, sophomore Walker Grimes and freshman Spenser Vegozen, a 5-8 seed, beat Bloomington's Tim Link and Oscar Beich 7-5, 7-6 (3) to win the state doubles tennis title. Coach Glenn Alfred decided to turn Grimes and Vegozen into a doubles team. They defeated the Bloomington pair, which had not lost a set all season and was the top seed.

Getting their kicks

3 Beginning in 1996, the boys soccer team won seven conference titles in a little more than a decade and peaked with a fourth-place finish in Class A in 2007. Led by Harrison Freund, Tommy Rosenbluth, T.C. Eley and Parker McMurray, the Colonels were a double-overtime winner against Bloomington Central in the quarterfinals but fell to Winnebago in the semis.

Basketball winners

4 Coach Tony Sirisevichs' 2003-04 and 2004-05 teams went 51-6, winning back-to-back Independent School League titles. Parker won the first behind seniors Kenny DeVance and Jabarri Reynolds. The 2004-05 team was led by Jimmy Warden, David Grossman and Bob McCormick and won the first boys basketball regional in school history.

Field hockey sparkles

5 Maggie Haskins, Joanna Share, Lizzie Manning and Erin Daly led the 1999 girls field hockey team to fourth place in the Illinois High School Field Hockey Association state tournament. The Colonels also placed first in the ISL with a 14-5-1 record. Coach Pat Pagnucco went on to achieve consecutive conference titles from 2002 to 2005.

WHAT PARKER MEANS TO ME

By Maggie Haskins: Haskins is a 2000 graduate of Parker and was featured on the ESPN show "Dream Job." She also wrote for SI.com and is working on her graduate degree.

My Parker athletic career got off to a bumpy start. To avoid a tag in junior kindergarten gym class, I dove headfirst into the wall. Twelve stitches did nothing to dampen my desire to be a Parker athlete.

From classmates, teachers and coaches, I learned participation allowed you to be a part of something bigger than yourself. Parker sports operate under a "no cuts" policy. If you show up and work hard, you're on the team. To participate is to fulfill the promise of Parker as "a model home, a complete community and an embryonic democracy."

I was fortunate to play on four Independent School League championship squads (basketball and field hockey, 1997 and 1999), and the key was the responsibility we felt to one another Ñ whether as a starter or the last one on the bench.

After Parker, my experiences on Ray Field and in the gymnasium continued to guide me. I made the Division I Brown softball team as a walk-on. I was not a starter, but Parker instilled in me that the value of being on a team was not entirely dependent on playing time.

The lessons learned in sports were an extension of the lessons learned in the classroom. Parker traditions, like the fifth-grade Medieval Fair and the eighth-grade play, put me on the stage, while sports put me on the field. Without those opportunities, I might never have attended the open casting call for ESPN's "Dream Job." My Parker education told me it would be good interviewing practice.

The desire to be part of a team again steered me to graduate school for broadcast journalism. The energy, excitement and interdependence of sports television mirrors the energy, excitement and interdependence I felt as a Colonel. While I learned to stop diving into walls, Parker taught me to never stop diving in.

NOTABLE ALUMNI

- Jonathan Alter: editor and columnist, Newsweek.

- Jennifer Beals: Actress.

- Debbie Jo Blank: 2008 Faulkner Poetry Prize winner.

- Daryl Hannah: Actress.

- Anne Heche: Actress.

- Ernst Jaffe: Recognized as founder of modern hematology.

- Eric Klinenberg: Sociologist/media critic/author.

- David Mamet: Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright.

- Joan Mitchell: Abstract expressionist painter.

- Joshua Mora: Anchor/reporter for Comcast SportsNet Chicago.

- Prexy Nesbitt: Civil-rights leader and educator.