On Friday, February 20th, PCA faced off against a solid lineup from Lakeside captained by Jeanne F
ields. Lakeside has some nice players on their roster and they brought their best to play us. At #1 Janet Lippincott (of Harambees Heroes fame) and Jonathan Burke faced off against Celes Panicelli and Tony Sciscione. We didn’t win this one and our court 1 opponents have not lost this year. Tough match.
At #2 doubles, we had some serious protection for preserving our win. Chow and Hammer protection is what I’m talking about. Coming off of their first round Kings & Queens tournament victory in straight sets, Kathy Joy Hammer and Dave Chow won 3&1 vs. Jane Bulman and Jeff Carroll. This was an exciting match to watch as we played aggressively, closed the net and dictated the tempo of the match. This was a nice win against a good opponent. Afterwards I heard Dave singing while
listening to his iPod in the locker room, something about his many aces that night – “This is a serve you just can’t touch, can’t touch this, can’t touch this, my my my, your return is a sitter?? Hammer Time!
At 3rd doubles, Margie Hamilton and Victor Munoz played very well against Jeanne Fields and newcomer Jason Fingerman. Jason self rated a few days prior to the match and published at 5.0 so we were a little concerned having a very strong player on court 3 – especially with what we knew would be a rough court 1. But alas, Margie and Victor played great and won 6 & 2. It was nice to see Victor on the court because he has a busy work schedule and has overcome some nagging injuries. Come to think about it – that might be a good new team name, “Nagging injuries” or “The Nags.” This thought should resonate with any of you who regularly read my musings – if you do you certainly know that I am “team name” challenged.
Ok, on to the competitive landscape for 8.0 MXD in PATD. The top 2 in the standings are the TA Pirates and us. The next match is a showdown Sunday, March 8th at 6:30pm at Tennis Addiction for essentially an automatic berth in the playoffs come April. Tickets are available at Ticket Master and StubHub. The Pirates will start Anthony Dececco and Brian Zansitis against us as they are the best 4.0 guy in PATD and 4.5 guy in PATD respectively. They are really 4.5 and 5.0 but I’m not going to complain about it (especially since they are both on my 9.0 team) – I’m just going to figure out a way to beat them.
The other beast in the flight is our nemesis, TST, a.k.a. The Springton Team. TST lost 0-3 to the Krushers earlier in the season and dropped a tough match 2-1 to the Pirates last Saturday. 2 losses is not the end for them but the rotund woman is warming up. For the record, this is a super team and it just goes to show you how competitive things have gotten in our little corner of the world.
The good news is that the Kinetix Second String knocked off the Kinetix Krushers in the upset of the season to date. This puts the Krushers a game back fighting for a playoff berth and they have still yet to play the top two teams in the flight. This was a stunning upset. Well done to their captain Liz Eukers!
Now on to the fun stuff, the Kings & Queens tournament. The first round matches are underway. In impressive fashion, KJ & Dave defeated Veronica Loch and Chris Kyper. This was the lower seed advancing and not surprising because we all anticipated a slew of upsets because the teams are so evenly matched. On Friday, 3/6 at 6pm two awesome parings face of at TA, Irene Acosta/Tom Ramsay play Cindy Basile/Chris Flouris. The winner of this war should at least make the semi finals. Most of the first round matches are scheduled at this point. Thank you everyone for being so proactive scheduling your matches. It’s hard to find convenient times and available courts to get these matches played.
That’s it for today – we have TST & the Krushers coming up after the Pirates but first things first. Just one note, yours truly has been playing in CPD this year. That is a competitive group out there. Virtually every team is competitive and it’s solid tennis. I am very impressed with the District, good people and good fun. This is definitely a sport that is growing.
