Arizona Open LPRT and Mixed recap

Congrats to your winners on the weekend:

• Women’s pro Singles: Paola Longoria
• Mixed Doubles; Longoria and Alex Landa
• Women’s Open: Angelica Barrios
• Women’s Open/Elite Doubles: Diaz/Ros

R2 Sports App home page for event:https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=37835

Lets review the notable matches in the Singles draw.

Singles Match report in the PRS database: http://rball.pro/FBCB63

In the 32s: some fun matches and some upsets

• #16/#17 went tie-breaker, because of course it did. #17 Erika Manilla took out her country-woman Sheryl Lotts in a breaker to setup an anticipated rematch with Longoria.
• #8 Valeria Centellas took out #25 Naomi Ros, notable because Ros is playing in her age 15 season (!). Ros recently moved to San Antonio after winning a couple of junior titles for Mexico in the late 2010s.
• #12 Carla Muñoz Montesinos was pushed by the young Mexican Daniela Rico but advanced. Rico is another young player to watch for going forward.
• #6 Angelica Barrios was pushed in game one by Michelle De La Rosa but then cruised to a two game win 13,3
• Ireland #1 Aisling Hickey continues to impress, taking a game off of #7 Jessica Parrilla before falling in a breaker. If I’m reading the r2sports profile correctly, Hickey is now living in California, so we should be seeing a lot more of her on the tour.
• The #15/18 match was as close as the 16/17, with #15 Maria Renee Rodríguez advancing past Erin Slutzky in a breaker.

In the 16s:

• Well, if you thought you’d see another close one between #1 Paola Longoria and Manilla … Paola had other plans. She put a statement out there with an utter domination, beating Erika 0,1. Manilla did not score until it was 0-9 in the second game. Between singles and her doubles performances so far, Longoria looks as locked in as I’ve seen her in a while.
• #9 Rhonda Rajsich got an excellent win over #8 Centellas in the breaker to move on to the quarters.
• #4 and #5 Natalia Mendez Erlwein and Gaby Martinez each cruised past LPRT regulars Carla Muñoz Montesinos and Amaya Cris to get to their expected quarter final matchup.
• #3 Alexandra Herrera faced a common foe in Kelani Lawrence, and each time they play it seems to get closer. This time around, Kelani took a game from the top Mexican lefty before Alexandra fought back for the 11-9 breaker win.
• #6 and #7 Angelica Barrios and Parrilla each cruised past LPRT veterans in Brenda Laime Jalil and Nancy Enriquez. Laime was not able to build on her US Open momentum … but also ran into a player in Barrios who has made multiple pro finals.
• #2 Maria Jose Vargas Parada was pressed in game one by LPRT vet MRR, but advanced 10,2

In the Quarters

• #1 Longoria downed her longest rival Rajsich, but was pressed to do so like no other player in this draw.
• #4 Martinez took out #5 Mendez with a well played 10,12 win.
• #3 Herrera held serve against the young Bolivian Barrios, who had topped her the last time they met.
• #2 Vargas fought off a match point against against #7 Parrilla to move on. A tough break for Leoni, who has STILL yet to advance to a pro semi since her knee injury 3 years ago.

In the Semis

• #1 Longoria blew out #4 Gaby 6,5 to move to the final. She continues to play lights out ball this weekend.
• #2 Vargas held serve against #3 Herrera 10,6 to setup a 1-2 final

In the Finals, Longoria continued her complete dominance over the tour at present, topping the #2 player Vargas 7,3 to take her 103rd career LPRT Tier1 title. She now has more than a 1,000 point lead atop the LPRT rankings, a gulf that could take quite a while for even the #2 to overcome.

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Mixed Pro Doubles review
Match report in the PRS database: none. I have the data captured locally but there’s so few mixed pro doubles matches that we have not build out a section off of www.proracquetballstats.com.
Here’s a recap of some of the fun Mixed pro matches:

• #1 Longoria/Landa came out configured interestingly against #16 Patrick Allin/Katie Neils, with Longoria on her backhand side. It seemed to flummox Allin and Neils, who switched back and forth to try to stem the flow of points against. In the end, the two top pro players advanced with ease 4,2.
• #8 Jake Bredenbeck/Lawrence went tiebreaker to advance past the husband/wife pair of Alan Natera Chavez and Munoz.
• #12 Andres Acuña/Vargas, with Acuna stepping in for original partner Moscoso, helped power the team to an “upset” over Lalo Portillo and MRR in a breaker.
• The #4 bro/sis Parrilla team destroyed team Formulaflow ( MoMo Zelada and Laime) 5,9.
• The biggest upset and shock of the round was the utter domination by the Manilla brother/sister team over #1 Samuel Murray/Gaby Martinez. The Manillas completely outplayed both sides of the top doubles pair and cruised to an 11,5 win.
• the underseeded #11 De La Rosa team upset #6 Carlos Keller Vargas and Centellas 10,11 to move into the quarters.
• The also-underseeded #10 team of Sebastian Fernandez and Herrera (who made the mixed pro doubles final in Denver), cruised past the #7 seeded team of Mario Mercado and Amaya.
• #2 Alvaro Beltran fought off an injury sustained earlier in the evening to move into the quarters with Mendez with a close win over Jake Bredenbeck and Lexi York.

Quarter final review:

#1 Landa/Longoria continued to dominate, winning 1,10 over Bredenbeck/Lawrence. They’re going to be tough to beat.

#12 Acuna/Vargas upset the Parrilla bro/sis team in two straight to move on.

The #11 DLRs cooled the red-hot Manilla team to move on.

#10 Fernandez/Herrera upset #2 Beltran/Mendez.
So your quarters are #!, #10, #11, and #12. Which goes to show you why its so hard to predict Mixed pro doubles, or to seed it based on player rankings.
In the semis:

#1 Longoria/Landa dominated the Acuna/Vargas team to move into the final. They’re going to be tough to beat.

The DLRs got a solid comeback win, topping the Denver Finalists Fernandez/Herrera to return to the final of a mixed pro doubles major.

In the final, Longoria/Landa blew out the DLRs in game one, then hung on to take the title 3,13.

Women’s Open Singles:
The top 4 seeds advanced to the semis as expected; all four are regular LPRT touring pros.
In the semis, #1 Barrios edged #4 Munoz 11-10, while Enriquez took out #2 Centellas in a breaker. In the final, Barrios took a tight two game win over the veteran Mexican.
Women’s Open/Elite Doubles:

The San Antonio based junior pair of Shane Diaz and Naomi Ros cruised through the 5-team RR to take the title.

Thanks for all the streaming on the weekend, especially from broadcasters Timothy Baghurst, Jerry J Josey Jr.., and Tj Baumbaugh.

Reminder to Players! Please like and follow this page so that when I tag you, you see it. Facebook will only retain tags of people that like/follow a page, which means lots of you are not getting the notoriety of getting tagged and noticed on FB. If your name is here and it isn’t tagged … it probably means I attempted to tag you but FB stripped it.

Next up?
Per our handy master racquetball calendar …
https://docs.google.com/…/1V6OTid6rZ356voXVkoV2sN7KMMb…/

IRT is in Sarasota, LPRT is in Chicago next Weekend!

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