While the NIU football team is stealing the headlines, the NIU men’s tennis team had some success of its own over the weekend at the ITA Midwest Regional IV Championship.

The duo of Juan Pablo Barriga and Erick Martinez won the doubles draw to advance to the ITA National Intercollegiate Indoor Championships, to be held in Dallas from Nov. 7-10.

The event is hosted by Southern Methodist, coached by former NIU coach Carl Neufeld.

Barriga and Martinez, both natives of Mexico, defeated Northwestern’s Josh Axler and Adam Schaechterle 8-6 in the championship match.

“We just focused on playing one point at a time and one game at a time,” Martinez said. “Our returns were working pretty well for us. We were making the other guys volley every time. We weren’t serving the best, but we were holding our serves.”

The victors’ road to the championship didn’t start off easy, as they knocked off the eighth-seeded duo of Northwestern’s Jaikie Jenkins and Chuck Perrin. The match went to the limit as Barriga and Martinez took the match 9-8.

“It was a very tough tournament,” Barriga said. “We kept playing better and better every match.”

“We just focused on playing one point at a time and one game at a time,” Martinez said. “Our returns were working pretty well for us. We were making the other guys volley every time. We weren’t serving the best, but we were holding our serves.”

The victors’ road to the championship didn’t start off easy, as they knocked off the eighth-seeded duo of Northwestern’s Jaikie Jenkins and Chuck Perrin. The match went to the limit as Barriga and Martinez took the match 9-8.

“It was a very tough tournament,” Barriga said. “We kept playing better and better every match.”

NIU’s success wasn’t limited to Barriga and Martinez. The pair of Aaron Forsberg and Raymond van Wasbeek advanced to the semifinals but saw their run end after a 9-7 loss to Axler and Schaechterle. They took a 5-2 lead in the match but weren’t able to close out the match.

“Both of our doubles teams played at a high level,” NIU coach Steve Rodecap said. “I’m very proud of our guys. It shows that their hard work is paying off.”

Van Wasbeek won two matches in the singles draw before being defeated by Illinois’ Brian Wilson, the second seed in the tournament.