IRT Minnesota Hall of Fame Tourney Preview

Moscoso is on a 3-tourney win streak, can he keep it going? Photo US Open 2019, Photographer Kevin Savory

After a month of National championships and a satellite last weekend, we get a full Tier 1 stop at the University of Minnesota for the 2026 Minnesota Hall of Fame event.

R2 Sports App link: https://www.r2sports.com/portfolio/r2-event.asp?TID=52146

Big draw this weekend, with 31 pros in the singles draw. Just two top 20 players aren’t here: Portillo fresh of his 1st Mexican national title and his fellow Mexican Jordy Alonso. Otherwise, the entire top 20 plus a big chunk of the 20-30 guys plus a slew of internationals are in town.

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Let’s preview the draw. Here’s some notable qualifying matches that i’m looking forward to:

In the round of 32:

– Garcia/Sam Bredenbeck is a tough one for both players, as one would expect in the 16/17 seed match.

– Trujillo is here again, and plays into a very tough Miranda in the opener.

– Sendrey and Carrasco meet again; they played in the 1st round of the Sioux Falls event a few weeks ago; will Cole have learned anything?

– Mendoza v Carter: DJ played great at USA Nationals; can he get an upset?

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round of 16:

– Waselenchuk v Garcia: would be a rematch of Sioux Falls round of 16 if Diego gets by the younger Bredenbeck brother. Kane handled him 5,9 then; would Diego be able to improve on that result? It just goes to show how tough it is to break out of that range of rankings.

– The 8/9 projects to be Manilla/Natera: Natera is coming off an upset early loss in Portland, while Manilla took out Lalo in the last event; advantage Adam.

– The Trujillo/Miranda winner takes on Jake, who’s fresh off a national championship and playing on his “home courts” so to speak. that’s a tough round of 16 for the big man.

– Portland’s champ and everyone’s favorite dark horse plays into Andree Parrilla … who beat him 11-10 twice in the span of a couple weeks last year. Flores just took out Acuna and one would think he could beat Parrilla as well, but he has to get over that mental hump.

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Projected Qtrs:

– Kane over Manilla in an all-lefty battle

– Flores over Jake: might as well stick to my dark-horse upset guns.

– Montoya over Acuna: Even though Acuna is the higher ranked player I think Montoya is the better player.

– Moscoso over Mar: fun fact; these two first played at Junior Worlds in 2014 as 18U. Other players at that event? Mercado, Acuna, Iwaasa, Manilla, Mar, and Garay. Phew; that was a stacked event.

Semis:

– Kane over Flores: remember, Flores took a game off of Kane in March 2024 in their first meeting, the first time people really took notice of the Bolivian. Would love to see another matchup to see what happens now.

– Moscoso over Montoya: would love to see this firepower semi.

Finals: another Moscoso vs Kane meeting. We’ve gotten it twice in two tournaments, and it’d be only fitting if we got another one. Their last meeting was a dominant 9,3 win for the Bolivian, who seems like he’s turning the mental corner against the long-time #1 player. Based on what I saw in Sioux Falls, I’m predicting another Conrrado win.

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Doubles review

Mar & Montoya just got upset in the Mexican nationals by Parrilla/Portillo, but there’s no Portillo here this weekend, so they are the #1 seeds and favorites. There’s some fun teams in the draw: Flores/Martell, the young-gun mexican team of Gastelum/Trujillo, Sendrey/Mendoza, the Bredenbecks playing together, Manilla/Parrilla, the Argentine national team of Garcia/Miranda, and the rising Bolivian team of Moscoso/Carrasco.

All will be gunning for Montoya/Mar, but none can get them.

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Look for Streaming in the regular places; follow the IRT on Facebook and sign up to get notifications when they go Live. Look for Carrie Reitmeier, Favio Soto, some guest shots from Minnesota native Matt Miller, and Pablo Fajre and the IRTLive crew behind the scens all weekend on the microphone, calling the shots!

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 Facebook. If your name is here and it isn’t tagged … it probably means I attempted to tag you but Facebook stripped it.

IRT Club Fantasy: If you’re in the IRT Club, sign up to play Fantasy Racquetball along with myself, Brian Pineda, and other club members. Also, be sure to tune into our Fantasy Fast Break podcast, which we do before and after every IRT Tier 1 event!

Associations

@International Racquetball Tour

Pelham Memorial Tourney of Champions quick recap

Jhonathan Flores with a big win to take the Pelham title. Photo via IRT IG

Pelham Memorial Tourney of Champions quick recap

There was an IRT-600 level satellite last weekend with some very solid international players making the trip up early to get in two IRT events along with next weekend’s Minnesota HoFame event; lets do a quick recap.

The Pelham Memorial in Portland has served as a Tier 1 in the past but has downgraded over the past couple years so as (per my understanding) to give more to the charities it supports. This year, the 600-level means that half the top 8 can enter along with anyone outside the top 8, which gave us a 21-man strong field.

r2sports link: https://www.r2sports.com/tourney/home.asp?TID=50667

Reminder: we don’t load non-Tier 1 events into the PRS database.

Your top 4 seeds here were Acuna, Natera, Carter, and Martell. They were set to face a stiff challenge from a slew of South Americans who made the long flight up. Lets recap what happened.

From the top half, #1 Acuna cruised into the semis, where he faced #4 Martell. Martell got a very solid win over #5 Miranda in the quarters, making this trip worthwhile since he missed Mexican Nationals for it. Acuna cruised past Martell in the semis to make the final from the top-side.

Meanwhile, the seeds in the bottom half ran into South American trouble early, as #2 Natera was taken out in the quarters by Diego Garcia, and #3 Thomas Carter was dominated by Bolivian Jhonatan Flores in the other quarter. In a battle of two of my favorite dark horses, Flores topped Garcia 7,8 in the bottom semi to move into the final.

There, Flores didn’t seem too troubled by Acuna, winning 9,6 to take the title. Flores has mostly been ousted of IRT tournaments lately by the likes of Waselenchuk and Parrilla, but Acuna is by far the biggest scalp he’s taken so far in his pro career, and sets him up nicely from a confidence perspective for Minnesota in a few days’ time. Not to spoil the Minnesota Preview, but Flores’ seed and pathway gives him a solid chance to go deep.

Flores also entered in the Men’s Open singles draw (instead of doubles), winning that over former Bolivian junior Ezequiel Subieta for a dual singles title winning weekend.

In Doubles, the Argentine national doubles team Miranda/Garcia took the title over Alan Natera and super-sponsor Mark Frank.

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Next up; Minnesota. We’ll be publishing a podcast for the IRT club later this week and I’ll do a preview once we have the draws and matchups.

Selectivo Nactional Raquetbol 2026 (aka Mexican Adult Nationals) Recap

Herrera claims her first Mexican National singles title Photo Denver 2021 KenFife

Congrats to your Pro winners on the weekend:

– Men’s Singles: Eduardo Portillo (Rodrigo Montoya was the 2nd qualifier)

– Women’s Singles: Alexandra Herrera (with Montse Mejia as 2nd qualifier)

– Men’s Doubles: Eduardo Portillo & Andree Parrilla

– Women’s Doubles Alexandra Herrera & Montse Mejia

TL/DR Executive Summary: Huge weekends for Portillo and Herrera, who both win their first ever Mexican National adult singles titles. Portillo & Parrilla win their second National doubles title in the last 3 years, while Herrera/Mejia win their 3rd out of the last 4 years.

R2 Sports App home page for event: https://www.r2sports.com/tourney/home.asp?TID=52435

Mexican Nationals runs as the rare double elimination event, at least for its singles draws. Qualification works like this: the winner of the winner’s bracket in Singles is qualifier #1, then the winner of the Loser’s bracket becomes qualifier #2. This may not necessarily be the other winner’s bracket finalist, and often is not. We only load the winner’s bracket matches into the PRS database.

Furthermore, unlike USA, Mexico does not run Mixed Doubles draws, instead choosing from their qualifiers to put together a mixed team at each Int’l event.

Here’s the Match report links to the four main draws this past weekend:

– Men’s Singles: https://rball.pro/363a40

– Women’s Singles: https://rball.pro/a7ff86

– Men’s Doubles: https://rball.pro/fc5f23

– Women’s Doubles: https://rball.pro/0f9c1a

And, here’s some historical links showing all the past Mexican champions in one spot. This data only goes back to around 2014 or so, which is when the current FMR regime “took over” and basically wiped out all the history. I’ve tried to create some placeholders to give past champions due credit, but if you’re reading this and you’re from FMR or from Mexico and you’d like to help build older Mexican nationals history so we can recognize accomplishments of Mexican Legends like Aliv, DLR, Gilberto Mejia, etc reach out please.

– Mexican National Champions history: Men’s Singles: https://rball.pro/1ae500

– Mexican National Champions history: Women’s Singles: https://rball.pro/1ae500

– Mexican National Champions history: Men’s Doubles: https://rball.pro/298f76

– Mexican National Champions history: Women’s Doubles: https://rball.pro/298f76

Let’s recap the four draws.

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Men’s Singles

The big early upset was Sebastian Hernandez, who just aged out of Juniors by reaching the semis of World U21s last December, taking out Andree Parrilla in the qtrs. Hernandez has NEVER played on the IRT but has represented Mexico internationally at the adult level twice. Mar took him out in the semis but he continues to get results. Portillo upset Montoya in the winner’s bracket semi with relative ease, then topped Mar for the title and #1 qualifying spot. Montoya dropped into the loser’s bracket and beat both Trujillo and Parrilla to get to the consolation final, where his doubles partner Mar gave him a walkover for the #2 spot on the team.

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Women’s Singles

I generally don’t like to talk about who wasn’t there … but in this case it needs discussing. Paola Longoria, who has won every single Women’s Mexican national title save for one since the 2007-08 timeframe, was not here. It was inevitable that she’d eventually have to miss an event like this due to injury, work, or life, but here we are. It will be the first time in a generation that she’s not leading the charge for her country internationally. In her absence, the two top seeds Mejia and Herrera cruised into the final, with the lefty Alexandra topping her doubles partner to claim her first national title. Mejia took out Jessica Parilla in the consolation bracket to claim the #2 spot on the team.

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Men’s Doubles

Portillo and Parrilla may only have a couple pro titles under their belt, but they’re becoming a force in world doubles. They cruised past both Hernandez/Trujillo in the semis and Montoya/Mar in the final to regain their title first won two years ago.

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Women’s Doubles

The Mexican National doubles title has historically been a battle between Longoria/Salas and Herrera/Mejia … the two pairs have met 7 times out of the last 8 years for the title. But, with no Longoria or Salas here, Mejia & Herrera faced little resistance rolling to their 3rd title together. They beat Jessica Parrilla and Anna Rivera in the final.

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Next up?

Per our handy master racquetball calendar …

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1V6OTid6rZ356voXVkoV2sN7KMM

There was an IRT satellite last weekend in Portland which we’ll recap soon, then next weekend is the IRT Minnesota Hall of Fame event as well as USA Racquetball High School Nationals.

USA Racquetball 2026 National Indoors Recap

Erika triple-qualified at US Nationals. Photo 2021 US Open via Kevin Savory

Congrats to your Open winners and new US National Team representatives: weekend:

– Men’s Singles: Jake Bredenbeck d Daniel De La Rosa

– Women’s Singles: Michelle (Key) Anderson d Erika Manilla

– Men’s Doubles: Daniel De La Rosa & DJ Mendoza

– Women’s Doubles: Erika Manilla & Michelle (Key) Anderson

– Mixed Doubles: Adam Manilla and Erika Manilla

Executive Summary: Erika Manilla wins 2 golds and triple-qualifies, while DJ Mendoza makes the adult national team for the first time. DLR also double qualifies in a Worlds year and will have a chance to defend his 2024 world singles title. Adam Manilla returns to the national team after a year’s absence due to injury. Michelle (Key) Anderson wins her first ever National singles title. Lastly, Jake Bredenbeck continues his long run on the National team by winning his first National singles title since 2019.

Congrats to all.

They join a distinguished list of direct US National team qualifiers, which I keep a roster of at this link: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1hfxiw8chi8Dpl8U0E4LjShVKaqY2OLqbhqBDpgYX7zU/edit?usp=sharing

The Winners and Finalists of the Singles competition, plus the Doubles winners in each discipline will have first right of refusal to represent the USA at two upcoming 2026-27 events: the 2026 IRF Worlds in August at a site TBD, and then the 2027 annual Pan American Racquetball Championships in late March 2027.

R2 Sports App home page for event: https://www.r2sports.com/tourney/home.asp?TID=50421

Here’s links to historical US National Team finals for the various disciplines. These go back all the way to 1968 for the Men, 1970 for the women, and 2022 for Mixed as a relatively new category.

– US Men’s Singles finals; https://rball.pro/85i

– US Women’s Singles finals: https://rball.pro/24a5f1

– US Men’s Doubles finals: https://rball.pro/adf3cd

– US Women’s Doubles finals: https://rball.pro/9c5514

– US Mixed Doubles finals: https://rball.pro/ffd5bf

Lastly, here’s the links for the 5 match reports for the 2026 event in one spot:

– US Men’s Singles 2026 Match Report; https://rball.pro/95a133

– US Women’s Singles 2026 Match Report; https://rball.pro/f9a662

– US Men’s Doubles 2026 Match Report; https://rball.pro/d03fe6

– US Women’s Doubles 2026 Match Report; https://rball.pro/0a6212

– US Mixed Doubles 2026 Match Report; https://rball.pro/c58778

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Let’s review the notable matches in the National team qualifying draws.

Men’s Singles:

There weren’t any major surprises in this draw early; #5 Sam Bredenbeck upset #4 Thomas Carter in the quarters to make the US semis for the first time in his career; for his troubles he had to match up against his brother Jake. The two had only played competitively once in their entire careers, amateur or professional, prior to this meeting. Jake took out younger brother Sam in the semis to make the finals and guarantee his 6th singles qualification to the US team. Meanwhile, a rusty Daniel De La Rosa had to fend off an in-form Adam Manilla in the bottom semi, eventually pulling away in the 5th to win, advance to the finals, and setup a third successive match against Jake for the US National singles title. More importantly, he guarantees his 4th US National singles spot. DLR didn’t play for the US in any of the 2025 competitions thanks to his pickleball commitments, but in a Worlds year he’ll be highly likely to look for a shot at defending his 2024 World singles title.

In the final, Jake dominated play, with solid defensive ball and excellent court coverage. He wins going away 11,8,3 to claim his first National singles title since 2019.

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Women’s Singles:

The Women’s singles draw was upset-city from the start. Defending US Champ Naomi Ros was ousted in the 1st round by veteran American player Lexi York, immediately ending any thoughts of a back-to-back title for the Texan. York ended up pushing #1 Manilla to five games before falling, but achieved her best singles result here in more than a decade (she finished 3rd in 2014).

Meanwhile, it was a tournament to remember for Michelle (Key) Anderson, who upset #2 Lotts and #3 Sanchez to reach the singles final and directly qualify for the US Team in singles for the first time in her career. This won’t be the first time she’s played singles internationally, but it’ll be the first time she’s in a US final.

In the final against her doubles partner, Anderson overcame Manilla’s power and played a better end game at every step to win a 4-game close match and claim her first ever National Singles title.

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Men’s Doubles:

Daniel De La Rosa won his third US National title, this time with a player with whom he had little to no prior playing experience with, dragging along Texas junior DJ Mendoza to the title. DLR and Mendoza, seeded 4th, had to dig deep just to upset the top seeds Carson & Manilla in the semis, then played a very close tactical game against the Bredenbeck brothers in the final, outlasting them 11-7 in the fifth. It’s the 5th time in the last 6 years that the brothers have made the national final but come up short, ending an agonizing day for the Minnesotians.

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Women’s Doubles:

Three teams of ladies battled it out for the US National title. The two 20-somethings Naomi Ros & Annie Sanchez fell in quick succession to the two veteran teams, leaving the defending champs Manilla/Anderson to face off against two long-time Team USA combatants Lexi York & Sheryl Lotts for the title. After two games of shot making split the teams, Manilla & Anderson pulled away and claimed their 2nd title in a row. It’s Manilla’s 4th Women’s doubles national title, Key’s second.

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Mixed Doubles:

The Mixed Doubles competition was the first to finish, with the finals played late Thursday before many had even arrived at the event. The first National champions crowned were the brother/sister duo of Adam and Erika Manilla, who earned the title with a hard-fought 5-game thriller over Jake Bredenbeck and Michelle (Key) Anderson.

With the win, Manilla earns his 3rd career National Team appointment and his second career Mixed Doubles title with his sister. Meanwhile, Erika earns her 3rd career Mixed US National title and ensures her 7th straight US National team appointment.

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Next up?

Per our handy master racquetball calendar …

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1V6OTid6rZ356voXVkoV2sN7KMM

There’s an IRT satellite in Portland honoring the late John Pelham, a long-running IRT-affiliated event. Mexico has their National championships next weekend as well, always one of my favorite tourneys to cover. Then we get into a very busy March on the calendar, with a slew of major events across pro, international, and outdoor disciplines.

US Nationals 2026 Preview

Adam Manilla is back after a year’s absence and ready to compete for US titles. Photographer Kevin Savory

This weekend, the top players from around the country descend on Arizona State University in Tempe for the National Indoor Championships. This is the 58th year of National Singles in this country; every year save for 2020 since 1968, the absolute longest running single event in the sport. We combined National Singles and Doubles a few years back into the “National Indoors” event, so in addition to all the amateur events this tournament will name the participants to the US National Team for the 2026-27 season (2026 Worlds and 2027 PARC).

R2 Sports App link: https://www.r2sports.com/tourney/home.asp?TID=50421

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Here’s quick previews of the five US National team draws

Men’s Singles: defending champion Daniel De La Rosa is here, and faces an interesting career decision. The 3-time IRT pro tour champ left professional racquetball for professional pickleball, but is currently out of contract with the pro pickleball tour. He has not appeared in a pro pickleball event since his contract termination last October, but has been seen on the racquetball courts, so he should be somewhat in-form to defend his title. He’s the #3 seed here; US National team qualifying draws goes straight from the current USAR rankings, and does not “protect” last year’s finalists like we used to do. Jake is #1, Adam Manilla is now #2 ahead of DLR.

DLR has to fend off Charlie Pratt to face Manilla in the semis, while Jake looks set to face the winner of his brother and Thomas Carter in the top semi. I’d guess we’re going to see a rematch of 2025’s final between DLR and Jake, with Jake taking the title over DLR. But I honestly have no idea how rusty or in-form DLR is; Manilla has been playing great lately and absolutely could take him out in the semis. We’ll see.

Women’s Open Singles: In a cryptic message, long-time US National team member Hollie Scott announced on the eve of the event that she was switching countries and would play for Guatemala going forward. This robbed the Women’s Singles draw of its top seed (Scott is currently the #1 ranked American) and elevated 3-time National champ Erika Manilla to the #1 seed. Long-time top US player Kelani Lawrence has stepped back from playing events as well, which thins the field significantly. Manilla projects into the defending US champ Naomi Ros in the semis, meaning someone’s going home off the National team between the two most recent Singles champs. From the bottom half, I could make an argument for any of the four to make a run: Annie Sanchez has been playing great lately, Hall of Famer Rajsich can still get wins, Michelle (Key) Anderson is a threat, and #2 seed Lotts has been getting career wins lately.

I’ll go with Ros over Sanchez in the final, a big youth movement statement for the two current/recently matriculated juniors.

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Men’s Doubles:

Defending doubles champ Rocky Carson is back, this time with lefty Adam Manilla, to form the formidable #1 seed. They’ll have to fend off 2-time champ De La Rosa, playing this year with fellow Texan DJ Mendoza, but should be the favorites in the final against the Bredenbeck brothers.

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Women’s Doubles:

There’s just three teams competing; the top seeds Manilla & Key are probably favorites, but if I just predicted a Sanchez-Ros singles final there’s no reason not to think that Sanchez/Ros as a team couldn’t win this.

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Mixed Doubles:

Last year Erika won the mixed with Erik Garcia (her brother was on the mend); they’re back together this year with a strong chance of repeating their 2024 title together as brother & sister. They’ll likely have to go through the very strong looking Bredenbeck/Key team to do so.

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Look for Carrie Reitmeier, Richard Eisemann, Sandy Rios, and Karen Grisz on the mike streaming off of the USAR’s facebook page all weekend.

Thanks to the Tourney Director Jonathan Greenberg of the USAR staff.

@USA Racquetball

Canadian Winter 2025-26 National Team Selection Event

Juliette Parent takes the Canadian Women’s singles title. Photo by Mike Sudoma/COC *MANDATORY CREDIT*

Congrats to your Open winners on the weekend:

– Singles: @samuel murray

– Doubles: @juliette Parent

TL/DR Executive Summary: Murray continues his dominance of Men’s racquetball north of the border, with his 22nd career Canadian national team event win. Meanwhile, Parent takes advantage of Lambert’s absence to claim her second career Canada-level title.

Trackie App home page for event: https://secure.racquetballcanada.ca/event/racquetball-canada-easterns-winter-national-team-selection-event/1017382/

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Let’s review the notable matches in the Men’s Singles draw.

Singles Match report in the PRS database: https://rball.pro/d89e3a

The final came down to Murray and Iwaasa, as it has done for nearly every single Men’s event for the last decade. Sam wins again to take a big lead into Canadian Nationals in May to continue to represent Canada on the international front, even as his pro career seems to be waning. Solid runs by Leyton Gouldie to get to the semis for the second time. Also, a rare sighting by Canadian legend Roger Harripersad, now 61 yrs of age, who lost in the first round.

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Women’s Singles recap

match report in PRS: https://rball.pro/f18826

Five ladies battled it out in a Round Robin, with Juliette Parent topping all comers to take the title.

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Next up?

Per our handy master racquetball calendar …

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1V6OTid6rZ356voXVkoV2sN7KMMbIP9SZd0MssH_nPGU/edit?usp=sharing

Next up is USA Racquetball Nationals this coming weekend in Tempe.

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tags

Racquetball Canada

46th Annual Lewis Drug IRT Pro-Am Recap

Moscoso gets a dominant win over Kane for his 12th career title. Photo unk from Bolivian IRIS

Congrats to your Pro winners on the weekend:

– Singles: Conrrado Moscoso

– Doubles: @Eduardo Portillo & @Andree Parrilla

TL/DR Executive Summary: Moscoso wins his 12th career title in dominant fashion, while Portillo and Parrilla get a solid win in the lead-up to Mexican Nationals in a few weeks.

R2 Sports App home page for event: https://www.r2sports.com/portfolio/r2-event.asp?TID=51976

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Let’s review the notable matches in the Singles draw.

Singles Match report in the PRS database: https://rball.pro/16c211

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In the 32s:

– Garcia took out Sam Bredenbeck, but needed a breaker to do so.

– Trujillo’s return proved fruitful, taking out Gastelum in the 32s and (as we’ll see later on) winning the Men’s Open title.

– Parrilla was pressed by the Canadian Connell but moved on.

– Carrasco gave Sendrey a setback 11,9.

– Former touring pro Pratt gave Portillo a lot more than he wanted in a round of 32 match but fell in two.

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In the 16s:

– My two favorite players to choose for upset wins early (Garcia and Flores) ended up playing the tourney’s two top seeds, and neither came much close to an upset. Kane beat Garcia 5,9, while Moscoso beat Flores 13,8 to move on. As it turned out, this was the closest match Moscoso would have in South Dakota.

– Natera made a statement against Alonso in the 8/9 game, cruising to a win.

– Trujillo pressed Parrilla but fell 12,13.

– Manilla got a great win, topping Portillo 9,7 to move on.

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In the Quarters

– Kane blew past Natera 5,2

– Parrilla dominated his long-time Rival Montoya 9,6

– Bredenbeck did not seem troubled by Mar 8,7

– Moscoso cruised past Manilla 5,2.

This setup a pure chalk semis.

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In the Semis

– Kane utterly destroyed Parrilla 2,0

– Moscoso wasn’t too troubled by Jake and won 6,9

In the Finals, we got the match most were looking for; 1v2, Kane v Conrrado. Legacy champ versus the up and coming possible replacement. The pair met in the semis of the SoCal Open in December, with Moscoso putting together a comprehensive game one and holding on for dear live to win in two .

On this day, Moscoso looked unstoppable. Game one was close for a while, but instead of Kane pulling away after a long mid-game period of closeness, it was his opponent, who turned a close game into a 15-9 win. In game two, it was one way traffic. Conrrado could do no wrong; he blitzed service returns, he hit his lines, he put away pinch shots, he played great defense, and Kane had no answers. Conrrado won game two 15-3 to take the title. Its Conrrado’s 3rd straight title, 14 match wins in a row, and his 12th in his career, tying him with DLR for 12th all time.

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Points Implications of results

With the win and with Acuna’s missing the event, Moscoso edges a bit closer to Kane and now sits in 2nd place. I’ve got them about 400 points apart, which seems like a lot, but the way the tour is going to determine the 2025-26 champion makes this race a ton closer.

At the end of June, presuming the US Open happens, the tour will have had somewhere in the range of 13-14 Tier 1s in that time along with a bunch of satellites. But, only the best 10 results will contribute to your final ranking. So, Right now Conrrado trails Kane by a ton of points, but their Tier 1 results since Jan 2025 look like this:

– Kane: 3 wins, 2 finals, 1 semi, 1 missed event

– Conrrado: 3 wins, 0 finals, 2 semis, 1 round of 16, 1 round of 32, 1 missed

So, if Conrrado has the opportunity to turn those last three results into a bunch of semis and finals, even if he doesn’t win out between now and June he’s got a ton of opportunity to catch up. This title race may very well come down to the last event.

Elsewhere in the top 10: Jake also jumps Acuna for 3rd, meaning that if i’ve got my spreadsheet estimate right, Acuna plays into Kane in the semis at the next event. Also, Natera now moves into 8th ahead of Lalo, Carrasco is up to 14th, and Gastelum drops down to 16.

Here’s a link to my IRT Rolling 2year Calendar XLS, which I use to approximate the points after each event. It is not exact but it’s usually close enough to the actual rankings, which @Ryan Rodgers does with @R2 Sports App on behalf of the tour after each event, to allow some quick post-event analysis before the rankings post.

men

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1z6eg6NJT6fjGMfRRyKTNLShAiDoz0TzzmQCt1_SbNBo/edit?usp=sharing

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Doubles review

Match report in the PRS database: https://rball.pro/6d76e5

This was a super fun draw. Two legends flew up to SD to play in Alvaro Beltran and Rocky Carson and they put on a show. Beltran teamed with the young phenom Flores and nearly took out the Montoya/Mar top pair, losing 11-10 in the quarters. Eventual winners Parrilla/Portillo barely got out of the first round, advancing over the Bredenbeck brothers by 14,14. Meanwhile, the legendary Carson teamed with lefty Adam Manilla and went on a huge run, upsetting the #2 seeds and making the finals before falling 14,7.

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Open Singles, other notable draws

– My two favorite youngsters Trujillo and Flores made it to the Open final, where they played a barn burner won by Trujillo 11-7 in the third, a pretty significant win for a player who’s taken some time off, and over a guy who a lot are looking at as the best of the next generation of players.

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Fantasy Racquetball Competition Wrap-up: Sam Murray is back on top after pipping me in the results this weekend.

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Thanks for all the streaming on the weekend, especially from broadcasters Favio Soto, Steve Schulze, Pablo Fajre and the IRTLive crew

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Next up?

Per our handy master racquetball calendar …

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1V6OTid6rZ356voXVkoV2sN7KMMbIP9SZd0MssH_nPGU/edit?usp=sharing

We’ve got one big event each weekend this month: Canadian Selection event next weekend, then USAR Nationals, plus Mexican Nationals is sometime in Feb, and then we get another IRT Satellite at the end of the month.

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International Racquetball Tour