Category: LPRT

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US Open Main Draw Previews

Sotomayor is the big upset winner from qualifying; how far can she go? photo credit; unknown.


Day one down, and all pro qualifying complete. We had some interesting results, but not a ton of super upsets on both sides, and we’re to the main draws.

Here’s a quick run through of matches to watch for today. We’re talking the 32s and 16s of IRT and LPRT singles, and the quarters of pro doubles on both sides.


IRT 32s and 16s: here’s what i’m looking for in terms of watchables:

  • #1 Kane Waselenchuk gets his first singles action since March of 2020 on the main court against noted trash talker Troy Warigon. A good warm-up for the King as he looks to retain his US Open title.
  • 16/17 seed we get, for the 3rd tourney running, Andres Acuña vs Adam Manilla. Can Acuna make it 3-for-3?
  • 8/25 Rocky Carson gets his tournament going against Bolivian vet Kadim Carrasco; can Carrasco make the USA veteran sweat?
  • 13/20 Sebastian Franco versus Mexican Alan Natera Chavez; Natera has shown upset power in the past; can he pull an upset here against the experienced Colombian?
  • 3/30 Alex Landa versus Erick Trujillo. A very intriguing opener for the #3 seed Landa, who has scuffled a bit over the last three events. He was seeded #1 at all three 2021 events, but got upset in each tournament (a Semi and two Quarters). In once case he was clearly hurt, in another he was clearly distracted. What is Landa this weekend? If he’s not on his game, Trujillo has been playing very well, with wins over solid players. If Landa isn’t 100%, this could be a huge upset.
  • 14/19 Thomas Carter has his work cut out for him against #19 Sebastian Fernandez; I sense an upset here. Patata’s seen his seeding slip a little bit as he’s stepped back a bit from playing, but he’s here and he’s a tough out.
  • #6 Andree Parrilla gets his start against a tough young mexican lefty Rodrigo Rodriguez. Expect Rodriguez to make Andree work for it here.
  • The 15/18 match will feature the most broken balls of the round, with two power players Rodrigo Montoya Solis and Eduardo Garay Rodriguez blasting off for a shot at DLR in the next round.
    Projecting round of 16s:
  • The big one here is 8/9: Carson vs Alvaro Beltran. These long-time IRT veterans have played each other no less than 50 times on tour, with Rocky leading 28-22. Who has the edge here?
  • 5/12 projects to two long-time Bolivian rivals in Conrrado Moscoso and Carlos Keller Vargas. They have met multiple times to determine the Bolivian national champion (including this year), they’ve met in IRF competitions … and they met earlier this year in Denver in the Semis, with Conrrado taking a close one. Keller can make this complicated for his talented rival.
  • 4/13 Samuel Murray vs Franco; every time these two meet, it goes the distance. Deep into tiebreakers, 5th game super tiebreaker, etc. Similar power games on display, both are one-time Tier1 winners. They havn’t met in years but they have split meetings in the past.
  • 7/10: Eduardo Portillo Rendon versus Jake Bredenbeck; a tough one to call. Jake played lights out in Chicago no doubt, but Lalo handled him in the 16s in Denver and has never lost to Jake. I know many are rooting for the home-town Minnesotan to advance, but Lalo is favored here.

LPRT 32s and 16s to look for:

  • 16/17 Kelani Lawrence versus Sheryl Lotts: Kelani has never lost to her sometimes-doubles partner, but its often pretty close.
  • #8 Jessica Parrilla is the unfortunate recipient of this year’s biggest draw wildcard in Vero Sotomayor. Sotomayor, who has not played an LPRT event since Dec 2016, blitzed through qualifying and has been training with other top LPRT players (not to mention her husband Sudsy Monchik), and looks to remind people of the player who finished #6 on tour in the 2008-09 season.
  • #13 Carla Muñoz Montesinos has a tough opponent in #20 Hollie Scott as her opener. They havn’t met on tour in years, but in the meantime Scott has proven herself to be among the elite the US has to offer.
  • 14/19 Amaya Cris versus Maria Renee Rodríguez; two long-time international rivals meet again. They’ve met 8 times in pro and IRF competitions, with Amaya holding a commanding 7-1 career lead.
  • #11 Rhonda Rajsich comes into the US Open with her lowest seeding since her debut (when she announced her presence to the world by racing to the final of the 2000 US Open as the #44 seed). Here she’ll be pressed by the tough mexican lefty Ana Laura Flores.
  • An all-Colombian 15/18 between Brenda Laime Jalil and Adriana Riveros should be close.
    projecting the 16s.
  • #8 Valeria Centellas set to take on the winner of Sotomayor/Parrilla; expect a battle here no matter who advances, with an eye out there for another upset in the Sotomayor run.
  • 5/12 Montse Mejia versus Nancy Enriquez; Mejia has shown signs of brilliance (winning in Kansas City) and then taken inexplicable losses (a round of 16 loss to Laime in Denver). Meanwhile, Enriquez has been playing well. upset watch here.
  • #7/10 Samantha Salas Solis vs #10 Angelica Barrios; an interesting matchup. Salas ended Barrios’ run at the 2019 Bolivian Iris open, but that was a different Salas. Meanwhile, Barrios has been ranked as high as 4th on tour but comes into this tourney 10th thanks to a dearth of events. Both of these players are better than their seeding, but only one can advance, and Barrios has shown some upset capabilities.

IRT doubles:

There’s still one qualifier to be played as of this writing and its between Mar/Montoya and Pratt/Natera; one would think the reigning gold medalists from the Pan Am Games would win, but its doubles. So you never know.
The Men’s doubles draw is stacked. All of these matches could go either way. Here’s a preview.

  • #1 Daniel De La Rosa/Beltran vs Roland Keller/Moscoso; the #1 seeds take on the very experienced Bolivian team, with a shot-maker in Moscoso and a doubles specialist in Keller. This is no cakewalk for the #1 seeds and could go breaker.
  • #4 Portillo/Parrilla take on the early morning final qualifier; it should be an all-Mexican affair, and I favor the Montoya/Mar pairing over their younger Mexican rivals in a slight upset by seed.
  • #3 Landa/Murray take on the upset kids of Manilla and David ” Bobby” Horn, who pulled off the upset last night to take out the 6th seeds in an 11-10 thrieller.
  • All eyes will be on the #2 seeds Monchik/Kane, who get their tournament started against the reigning Bolivian doubles champs in Keller/Carrasco. I’d expect this to be a straight forward two-game win for the #2 seeds.

LPRT Doubles
A couple of upsets in the qualifiers have led to some fun quarter final matches:

  • #1 Paola Longoria/Salas take on the all-american team of Scott/Kelani. Expect the top seeds to move on here.
  • #4 Ana Gabriela Martínez is paired with her long-time Guatemalan teammate MRR, but they face a tough quarter going up against Sotomayor and Maria Jose Vargas Parada. I sense they’ll “pick on” MRR here strategically and pull the upset.
  • #3 The current Argentinian national team pairing of Centellas and Natalia Mendez Erlwein takes on the reigning US champs Rajsich and Manilla. Fun match; can the US team pull the upset?
  • #2 Alexandra Herrera and Mejia take on the up-start all-Bolivian team of Barrios/Daza. While the Bolivian team are both top-notch doubles players, I’m not sure anyone is stopping Herrera/Mejia until the final.

both IRT and LPRT are streaming; make sure you follow both on Facebook for all your streaming needs.

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US Open Qualifying Preview

Kane is back playing singles for the first time since Mar 2020. Photo US Open 2019, Photographer Kevin Savory


Welcome to the 25th annual US Open.


This is such a massive tournament that we’ll break down the preview into Wednesday’s qualifiers and then the rest of the tourney. 76 Men and 44 women pros entered into the respective singles draws; this is down a bit from 2019 for the Men, but is up a bit for the Women. Great to see players from all over the world in action on the sport’s biggest stage.
r2sports home page: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=31929
No real predictions here, just some thoughts on good matches in the four draws to look for as play starts on Wednesday.


IRT Men’s Pro qualifying features two rounds on Wednesday; the 128s and the 64s. Here’s some matches i’d be watching:

  • Solid east coast/west coast matchup between multi CT state champ Jose Flores and SoCal’s Majeed Shahin.
  • Bolivia’s Kadim Carrasco takes on Mexican legend Javier Moreno in a fun return for the former long-time International lefty. We havn’t seen Moreno in an IRT event since May 2016, not at a US Open since Nov 2015. Great to see him back.
  • Florida state champ Jonathan Burns takes on Mexican veteran Abraham Peña in an interesting opener.
  • The Kelley brothers are here; Sam takes on Colombian youngster and team Zurek player Juan Pablo Rodriguez Castrillon, while Joe takes on Idaho junior Alexxander Purcell . Both Kelley brothers have solid chances to move to the 64s.
  • Veteran lefty and multi-national amateur champ Jeff Stark takes on Bolivian Miguel A. Arteaga Guzman in a tough opener for both.
  • Maryland’s recently matriculated junior doubles national champ Dylan Pruitt faces off against a very tough Mexican lefty in @rodrigo rodriguez.
  • Arizona youngster Ben Baron takes on a player more than twice his age in veteran Floridian Alejandro Herrera Azcarate. Don’t be fooled by the age difference; Herrera brings the heat.
  • The legend Cliff Swain returns to the tour for the first time since oct 2016 and opens against “The Ref” Scott McClellan. Might be a short tourney for the IRT’s main ref; I have it on good authority that Cliff is playing lights out.
    Projecting to the 64s, here’s some possible great matches for spots in the main draw:
  • Troy Warigon versus Shaheen: another east coast vs west coast battle.
  • Carrasco vs Burns: I’m projecting a fun battle here of veteran players to make the main draw.
  • Georgia’s Maurice Miller likely takes on Guatemalan Juan Salvatierra for the main draw.
  • another Georgian Austin Cunningham has an excellent chance to get to the 32s, projecting against Mexican youngster Erick Cuevas
  • Alan Natera Chavez, one of the higest ranked players pushed to qualifying, has his work cut out for him against Colombian international vet @andres gomez.
  • If Pruitt can win his first match, he likely gets his long-awaited grudge match against Formulaflow’s Mauricio Zelada, who challenged his young Maryland-area rival last year in a money match that never materialized.
  • Sam Bredenbeck has a great chance to qualify against Colombian international veteran Set Cubillos Ruiz.
  • Two long-time international players project to play each other with Colombian Herrera projecting to Costa Rican vet Felipe Camacho.
  • Swain will have to earn his round of 32 against former IRT touring player Nick Riffel in the 64s.
  • Lastly, Eduardo Garay Rodriguez will be tested against the tricky Colombian player Francisco Gomez, who surprised with a couple of upsets in the 2019 US open.

LPRT qualifying preview

Like the Men, the women will play two rounds of qualifying to make the 32s. Here’s some interesting qualifiers to watch for.

  • We have not seen Verónica Sotomayor since Dec 2016 on tour; but she’s back and now living in Florida, training with her husband Sudsy Monchik and ready to play. I have it on good authority (ahem, Sudsy) that Vero is going to make noise this week. She starts in the 128s against Korean Sumin Lee.
  • Bolivian veteran Jenny Daza Navia gets started against American junior Minnesota native Ava Kaiser.
    Projecting the 64s
  • Sotomayor has a great chance to move into the 32s against Colombian María Paz Riquelme.
  • Two top American women are set to go head to head, with Michelle De La Rosa projecting to play Erika Manilla for a spot in the main draw. Tough match here for both.
  • USA Florida youngster Graci Wargo will be tested by Bolivian vet Daza.
  • Texan youngster Shane Diaz has an interesting match against Ecuadorian Maria Jose Munoz.
  • Lastly, there’s a second “Maria Munoz” in the draw who we think is actually Maria Paz Munoz ( Pazita Muñoz Albornoz ). We could be wrong, but if this is Pazita, she’s an excellent international veteran who will really push her round of 64 opponent Erin Nocam aka Erin (Rivera) Groves into a tougher match than either deserves here.

IRT Doubles preview

So, I’ll just say it. I hate the IRT doubles qualifying structure at the US Open. 4 teams get byes to the quarters, then another 17 compete for the other 4 spots. I just don’t like this, but i’m not sure what the right way to fix it is. If you gave top 8 teams byes into the 16s … then you have 13 teams competing for those 8 open spots, which means some of them don’t even have qualifiers and you’re giving another 3-4 teams byes as well. So there’s no good solution.

That being said, there’s some very good doubles teams in qualifying, and a lot of good teams are going home early.

  • Costa Rican national team of Andres Acuña and Camacho takes on the reigning us national doubles champ Charlie Pratt Racquetball, playing this weekend not with his title-winning partner Rocky Carson but with Natera. Carson opted not to play pro doubles … but is playing Centurian doubles with Jerry Hall.
  • The #9 seeded Bredenbeck brothers take on a very tough Mexican lefty/righty duo in Sebastian Fernandez and Rodrigo Rodriguez. Upset watch here.
  • Top Bolivian doubles team and multiple-IRF title wining duo of Conrrado Moscoso and Roland Keller take on the Guatemalan national team of Javier Martinez and @juan salvatierra. I don’t think the Bolivians are one and done here.
  • Meanwhile, the current reigning Bolivian National champs Carlos Keller Vargas and Carrasco take on two fellow Bolivians in Rodrigo Mendoza and Miguel Angel Arteaga Chavez. Tough draw; flying 4600 miles to play someone you could have driven to play in your home country.
  • Super interesting matchup between two all-American teams; Adam Manilla got David ” Bobby” Horn out of retirement to play, and they face off against Warigon & Miller, a veteran team who has played together for years. Should be a very interesting matchup with plenty of trash talk on the court.
    Assuming some first round results, here’s some very interesting possible round of 16 matches to determine who makes the money rounds:
  • #5 seeds Rodrigo Montoya Solis and Javier Mar probably feel hard-done by the seeding forcing them to play two extra matches, but they should be able to handle their opener and then a likely meeting with the Costa Ricans.
  • Kellern & Moscos project to play the Lefty/Righty mexican pair of Patata and Rodrigo; fun one.
  • In another all-Bolivian match-up, Keller/Carrasco project to play team Formulaflow in Zelada and Mario Mercado. Keller/Carrasco topped Zelada at Bolivian Nationals earlier this year, but Mercado is a different beast on the court.
  • the winner of the all-american trash talking match between Manilla/Horn and Warigon/Miller likely faces the #6 seeded Colombian/Zurek construction team of Eduardo Garay Rodriguez and Sebastian Franco. I don’t think Garay/Franco are losing here, irrespective of who they play.

LPRT doubles qualifying


Not a ton of doubles qualifying … but some very intriguing match-ups thanks to top players without a ton of doubles points.

  • Michelle De La Rosa and Sheryl Lotts take on Sotomayor and Maria Jose Vargas Parada. Wow. Brutal draw for both sides; It wasn’t too terribly long ago that Vargas was part of the 2nd best doubles team in the pro tour.
  • Another fun one: Angelica Barrios teams with veteran Bolivian and excellent doubles player Daza and face Micaela Meneses Cuellar playing with Ana Laura Flores. The Lefty/Righty pair will give Barrios/Daza some things to think about, but the two native Bolivians should move on.
  • Should Vero/Vargas move on, they face a winnable match against #5 seeds and longtime Colombian pairing of Adriana Riveros and Amaya Cris.
  • 2018 US national doubles champ Kelani Lawrence teams with Hollie Scott to take on two younger Colombians in Camila Rivero Torrez and Brenda Laime Jalil in a fun opener.
  • Should Barrios/Daza move on, they run into the tough lefty/righty Mexican pairing of Jessica Parrilla and Montserrat Perez, a darkhorse here.
  • the reigning US national doubles champions Manilla and Rhonda Rajsich should survive a first round against two young tough players in Naomi Ros and Shane Diaz, but will have their work cut out for them against #6 seeds Nancy Enriquez and Carla Muñoz Montesinos, two excellent doubles players.

Phew. Play starts bright and early Wednesday 10/6/21, 8am central. can’t wait to start seeing some match results.

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World Singles & Doubles Wrap-up Part 2: Doubles draws

Montoya a double winner on the weekend, solidifying his status as a top doubles player. Photo Gearbox promotional


Part 1 focused on the two pro singles draws; this one covers the three main doubles draws.
Congrats to your winners on the weekend:Mixed Pro Doubles: Rodrigo Montoya Solis / Samantha Salas Solis

Men’s Open Doubles: Rodrigo Montoya & Javier Mar

Women’s Open Doubles: Jessica Parrilla & Montserrat Pérez

R2 Sports App home page for event: https://www.r2sports.com/tourney/home.asp?TID=30515

Quick commentary on the divisions…
In Mixed Pro, the #7 seeded Montoya/Salas blitzed through the draw, dominating every one of their matches save for their match against my pre-tournament favorite Alvaro Beltran & Montse Mejia. I think its safe to say that the pairing of Montoya and Salas, which comprises the reigning World and Pan Am Games doubles champion in Montoya and a woman in Salas who has won no less than 33 pro doubles titles should have been seeded higher.

They topped the #8 seeded team of Sebastian Fernandez and Alexandra Herrera in the final. Patata and Alexandra also similarly blitzed their way through the draw, not dropping a game until the final and including a dominant 8,10 win over the #1 seeds and defending champs Daniel De La Rosa and Michelle De La Rosa.

Men’s Open Doubles PRS Match Report: http://rball.pro/4CDCD8

In Men’s Open Doubles, Montoya & Mar (again, the reigning World, Pan Am Games and Mexican champions) were somehow only seeded 3rd and faced a gauntlet of matches to make the final. In the quarters they downed the top Bolivian team of Conrrado Moscoso and Roland Keller, a rematch of the 2019 Pan Am games gold medal match. In the semis they dominated the #2 seeded Colombian team of Eduardo Garay Rodriguez and Sebastian Franco, then got an unfortunate walk-over win in the final against the newly crowned Bolivian national champs Carlos Keller Vargas and Kadim Carrasco (reason unknown, maybe an early flight?). Nonetheless, Montoya & Mar proved once again that they’re in the conversation for best doubles team in the world.

Women’s Open Doubles PRS Match Report: http://rball.pro/FE4165

In Women’s Open doubles, the very solid lefty-righty team of Parrilla and Perez cruised through the bottom side of the draw to the finals. There, they met the newly crowned USA national champs Rhonda Rajsich and Erika Manilla, who had to win a rematch of the USA championships in their quarters, then down a tough #1 seeded team of Nancy Enriquez / Carla Muñoz Montesinos to make the final. There, a battle ensued, going down to the wire, with the Mexican pair saving match point against to win 11-10 and claim the crown.

—

Next up?
we have a busy upcoming weekend:

  • the 3rd annual Alex Landa tournament is in Juarez: https://www.r2sports.com/portfolio/r2-event.asp?TID=37803
  • The annual New Smyrna Beach WOR event is in Florida: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=37823
  • – the 4th Annual Rocky Carson clinic is in Indiana: https://www.r2sports.com/portfolio/r2-event.asp?TID=37829

Once again, thanks to all the streamers and to Jim Hiser for making this event happen.
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World Singles & Doubles Wrap-Up Part 1: Pro Singles draws

Ana Gabriela Martinez wins her first pro title. Photo via Gaby


Congrats to your winners on the weekend:

  • IRT pro Singles: Daniel De La Rosa
  • LPRT pro singles; Ana Gabriela Martinez

R2 Sports App home page for event: https://www.r2sports.com/tourney/home.asp?TID=30515

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

Singles Match report in the PRS database: http://rball.pro/C05199

In the 128s and 64s:

  • Kadim Carrasco got a solid tiebreaker win over Mexican vet Abraham Peña to earn a spot in the main draw.
  • We were robbed of a potentially awesome round of 32 projection when #20 seed Javier Estrada no showed; this paved the way for little-known Bolivian Miguel A. Arteaga Guzman to earn a spot in the main draw with two good wins.
  • – #23 seed MoMo Zelada got two solid wins over veteran internationals Set Cubillos Ruiz and Javier Martinez to earn a round of 32 main draw spot.

In the 32s:

  • #17 Andres Acuña cooled the home-town favorite #16 Adam Manilla and advanced 12,5. Manilla had a great tournament in Austin in January 2020, making the semis and nearly making the final, but more and more its looking like a one-off as he hasn’t been able to replicate that success since.
  • #19 Carlos Keller Vargas eked out game one against #14 Thomas Carter, then raced to a two game win 14,1 for one of the only two upsets by seeding in the round.
  • #11 Mario Mercado took a really tight match against #22 Alan Natera Chavez to move on 14,12. Two really evenly matched players and Mercado got a good win.
  • #10 Sebastian Franco played really solid ball to beat his former Baltimore neighbor Zelada 5,4 to move on.
  • – The only tiebreaker of the round, fittingly, was in the 15/18 match, where Eduardo Garay Rodriguez got a really solid win over Sebastian Fernandez 11-9 in the breaker. Might have been 11-10; i heard it one way but R2 has it another. Two really solid up and coming players and the crowd got a great match as a result.

In the 16s, a slew of upsets and really big surprises.

  • #1 Alex Landa and #17 Acuna played quite a contentious match, building one some previous “history” between the two players, which resulted at one point having to have the players separated on the court. The antics seemed to fire up Landa, who bounced back after dropping game one to dominate the second game and eventually advance in the breaker. No Love lost here.
  • #8 Lalo Portillo came back from a game one defeat to dominate the breaker 11-1 to move past #9 Jake Bredenbeck.
  • #5 Andree Parrilla turned the tide on recent matches against his long-time rival #12 Rodrigo Montoya Solis and advanced 14,3. Parrilla has really turned it around since going on a slide of form in early 2020 and this was a great win, avenging a loss to Montoya in the Mexican National finals earlier this year.
  • In the biggest upset of the round, Carlos Keller Vargas absolutely destroyed #3 Samuel Murray 6,4 to advance to just his second ever IRT pro quarterfinal. Murray was the champion of the previous IRT event and a favorite to advance deep, but is a one and done in the pro draw here.
  • #11 Mercado got another solid win, this time downing #6 Alvaro Beltran in two solid games 12,6.
  • #7 Conrrado Moscoso nearly got pushed to a breaker by #10 Franco, but finished the match off to win in two games.
  • – #2 Rocky Carson handled Garay’s pop and moved on in two games 11,10 to setup a juicy quarter final.

In the Quarters, some seriously unexpected results.

  • #1 Landa tweaked something in his back early in his match against youngster #8 Portillo and fell with little resistance 3,4. Landa asked for an injury time out but was denied, and basically went through the motions for the entirety of the match. Portillo advances to just his 4th ever pro semi.
  • #4 DLR handled #5 Parrilla 10,10, continuing his relative dominance over his younger country-man.
  • #19 Keller continued his career-best performance, building on just his second ever quarter final by winning a close match against his former country-man Mercado to advance to his first ever pro semi. Bravo to Keller for this great run.
  • – For the fourth time in four tries, #7 Moscoso downed #2 Carson on the pro tour. This time Carson bounced back from a blow out first game loss to make it a match, and Moscoso had to dig down to take the 11-9 breaker.

In the Semis

  • DLR took advantage of Landa’s upset loss by taking out Lalo in a breaker to move into the final.
  • Moscoso downed his countryman Keller, in a rematch of the Bolivian national singles final two weeks ago 10,14 to move into the final. Moscoso makes the finals for the 4th time in his 11 pro appearances.
    In the Finals, a meeting between two players who are 2-2 lifetime in pro and international events turned into a relatively one-sided affair. DLR took a commanding lead in the first game and threatened to donut Moscoso before Conrrado pulled back a handful of points to make it respectable. Everyone anticipated a rebound game in the 2nd, but DLR’s veteran, calm approach to the match was the story. Daniel did not panic, stuck to his game plan and wore down the flashy but inconsistent Bolivian to take the title 7,13.

With this win, DLR earns his 5th pro title and takes back over the title for most titles by a Mexican player from Landa.

Lets review the notable matches in the Women’s Singles draw.
Singles Match report in the PRS database: http://rball.pro/9F93A8
In the 32s:

  • We were robbed of a fun all-USA match when Hollie Scott no-showed, giving Lotts a walkover.
  • #5 Natalia Mendez Erlwein was pushed to the absolute distance by USA’s Erika Manilla, the home-town favorite, but she saved match point against in a back-and-forth tiebreaker to win 11-10. Manilla crushed Mendez in game 2, but Mendez gritted out the win.
  • #19 Micaela Meneses Cuellar dominated #14 Maria Renee Rodríguez 10,2 to get a statement win on tour. The 18U junior is getting some really great international experience this year and could be one to watch for, the latest in a continuing line of top Bolivian juniors.
  • #11 Nancy Enriquez dominated #22 Lucia Gonzalez to advance 4,12. The last time they faced off, Gonzalez shocked Enriquez (and Herrera) to advance to the 2020 Mexican National semis … but Enriquez showed little weakness in this match.
  • 15 Brenda Laime Jalil cruised past her frequent DC-area rival Masiel Rivera Oporto 9,4. I thought this would be a lot closer.

In the 16s, one monumental upset and a couple of good matches.

  • #8 Valeria Centellas moved past #9 Rhonda Rajsich 9,4.
  • Bolivian junior Meneses took a game off of #3 Maria Jose Vargas Parada before Vargas took the match in a breaker. Great showing by Meneses, who has quickly been improving her game this year.
  • #11 Nancy Enriquez took a really tough match against #6 Jessica Parrilla, continuing her recent excellent run of form. The two traded blows and games to 14 before Enriquez blanked Leoni in the breaker.
  • #10 Ana Gabriela Martinez took a very nice close game against her long-time international rival #7 Angelica Barrios 11,14. These two go back well into Junior racquetball, and played a quality match here.
  • In the shocker of the tournament, #15 Laime took out #2 Montse Mejia in a tie-breaker. Mejia is the winner of the most recent tournament and was my odds-on favorite to blow through this draw; instead she’s out in the quarters in a shocking result. Kudos to Laime, who advances to her third career pro quarter.
    In the Quarters:
  • #1 Alexandra Herrera took care of business and downed #8 Centellas in two 9,9. I had predicted an upset here, but the lefty #1 seed played well and took out a dangerous opponent.
  • #5 Natalia Mendez Erlwein got a really good win over #4 Samantha Salas Solis to get into the semis of another major. These two have met in each of the last three LPRT events, and Mendez now has won two of those three meetings.
  • #3 Vargas showed that she’s back in full, advancing past the in-form Enriquez in two games.
  • #10 Martinez took advantage of Laime’s earlier round exploits and blasted the young Colombian 3,7 to move into the semis. Gaby is the new favorite to win this event.


    In the Semis:
  • Herrera topped Mendez for the 9th time in 10 tries on pro and IRF events, needing a tiebreaker to do it.
  • Martinez went two full games to top #3 Vargas 13,10 to move into the final.

In the final:…two good friends who just had a practice session in Guatemala a few weeks ago battled it out to determine which of the two would be a first-time pro winner. In the end, Gaby outlasted Alexandra in a tiebreaker, racing to a commanding lead and holding on as both players gave everything on the court. Gaby wins (12),9,4 to become the 30th known winner in the history of the Ladies pro tour.

Points Implications of results
On the IRT side, assuming the policy of not expiring old points, the rankings won’t move too much. But there are some moves:

  • DLR moves from #5 to #3.
  • Moscoso and Beltran switch places at 7/8.
  • Mercado and Franco switch places at 11/12
  • Keller the big mover; improving from 21 to 16 with his semis win.
  • The other big mover is Miguel Angel Arteaga, who takes advantage of a surprise withdrawal to make the 32s and jump from #71 to #47.


    On the LPRT side…. some big moves.
  • Martinez jumps from #11 to #4 with her win, rightfully taking her spot among the tour’s elite.
  • Despite missing the event, Longoria retains her #1 ranking by a sizeable margin. She could probably miss another 4 events without losing the top spot.
  • Mejia drops from 3 to 5, and Salas drops from 5 to 7 with their upsets.
  • – Lastly, a landmark bit of history on the professional tour. Rhonda’s finish likely means she’s dropping out of the top 10, which means that personally she drops out of the top 10 for the first time since 1999. However it also means that for the first time ever, no USA-born player is in the ladies top 10. The highest ranked USA player projects to be Sheryl Lotts at #16.

Open Singles and other significant draws:

  • Men’s Open Singles final was won impressively by Mexican junior Erick Trujillo, who topped Colombian veteran Set Cubillos Ruiz in the final. Cubillos advanced past a rich international draw, defeating players from Bolivia, Costa Rica, Guatemala and Mexico. Trujillo’s more impressive win was in the semis, taking out top Mexican touring vet Alan Natera in the semis.
  • Trujillo also took the 18U title on the weekend, beating a number of players he’s likely to face in Junior Worlds later this fall. He topped Bolivian 18U champ Hector Barrios (Angelica’s brother) in that final.
  • Women’s Open was taken by Angelica Barrios – Raquetbolista, who topped American Sheryl Lotts in the final.
  • – Micaela Meneses took the Girls 18U title over American 18U champ Annie Roberts in a possible World Juniors final preview.

Thanks for all the streaming on the weekend from both the IRT and LPRT crews, Thankyou Dean DeAngelo Baer, Favio Soto, Pablo Fajre, Timothy Baghurst and Tj Baumbaugh for all your hard work on the mike.
Thanks to the Tourney Director Jim Hiser for putting this event on!

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?Part 2 of the wrap-up covering the doubles draws.

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World Singles & Doubles Open – Doubles Draws Preview

Michelle De La Rosa is part of the #1 ranked Mixed doubles team; can they prevail in Denver? Photo Mike Augustin Vegas 2019

Part 2 of our preview; the Doubles draws. This event is special because it is one of the few times a Mixed Pro doubles draw is offered and promoted heavily, and thanks to the prize money many of the pros are playing singles and mixed instead of gender doubles in Denver.
Once again, shout out to Tournament Director and primary sponsor Jim Hiser for making this event happen, with tons of sponsorship dollars and dealing with local covid related ordinances.

R2 Sports App link: https://www.r2sports.com/tourney/home.asp?TID=30515

First, lets preview the Mixed Doubles draw, which is huge and which is a priority this weekend over the Gender-specific doubles draws.
20 teams are here. The seeding of Mixed pro doubles is tough since we have so few events to go by. By my count there’s only been two relatively full strength mixed doubles tournaments in the last 5 years, so we don’t have a ton to go on. The seeding of this draw may be debatable, but what’s for certain is that we’re going to get a ton of great matches.
Here’s a preview of the matches that i’ll be interested in watching:


In the 32s:

  • an all – Ecuadorian team of Juan Francisco Cueva and Maria Paz Munoz is here to compete, and they take on the all-american duo of veterans Charlie Pratt Racquetball and Rhonda Rajsich. I like the USA team to move on; Pratt is a highly decorated doubles player and Rajsich owns dozens of doubles titles in her career.
  • A heavy Bolivian presence in the 14/19 match, featuring Bolivian doubles specialist Roland Keller with junior phenom Micaela Meneses Cuellar taking on MoMo Zelada teamed with Brenda Laime Jalil . Laime represents Colombia now, but is Bolivian born.
    In the 16s:
  • #1 seeded husband/wife team of Daniel De La Rosa and Michelle De La Rosa get their tourney started, likely against a tough team of hard hitters in Erik Garcia and Masiel Rivera Oporto . This is going to be a tough tournament to win, and the DLRs have a tough opener.
  • The dark-horse team of Mario Mercado and Valeria Centellas is seeded 9th here. They have a really tough opener against LPRT #2 Alexandra Herrera playing with Sebastian Fernandez. Herrera is part of what is easily the 2nd best ladies doubles pairing in the world and arguably could be the best; this is a tough #8 seed and a tougher 8/9 matchup.
  • Samuel Murray is playing with Ana Gabriele Martinez, and they face off against the husband-wife pairing of Alan Natera Chavez and Carla Muñoz Montesinos. Natera is a frequent doubles competitor; how will he fare on the court with his wife?
  • The brother/sister team of Andree Parrilla and Jessica Parrilla is seeded 4th here and should be a threat to win. They’ll have their hands full though in their opener against Pratt/Rajsich. Both Parrillas can out hit the veteran Americans, but doubles is about tactics as well. I like the USA vets to upset here.
  • The hard-hitting #3 seeds of Conrrado Moscoso and Maria Jose Vargas Parada should be interesting to watch: they will be tested early by the all-Bolivian winners (likely Keller and Meneses)
  • Angelica Barrios and Lalo Portillo are you 6th seeds; they are set to face two excellent doubles players in Javier Mar and Amaya Cris. Upset watch here over the young 6th seeded team.
  • The 7th seed team of Rodrigo Montoya Solis and Samantha Salas Solis seems painfully under-seeded: Salas has won dozens of doubles titles with Longoria, and Montoya is the reigning Pan Am Games doubles champ with Mar. They will be tested by two excellent doubles players here in Natalia Mendez Erlwein and Andres Acuña but should move on.
  • The all-Manilla team of Adam Manilla and sister Erika Manilla will face off against the #2 seeds Alvaro Beltran and Montse Mejia; despite the lefty-righty combination I sense the excellent Mexican pair will advance.
    In the Quarters, my projections:
  • #1 DLR/DLR will have their hands full with the Mercado/Centellas team; Mercado is a sneaky good doubles player and Centellas is a rising star on the LPRT. But there’s no finer doubles player in the world than Daniel De La Rosa; tiebreaker win for the top seeded husband/wife pair.
  • Murray and Martinez advance past the American Vet team Pratt/Rajsich.
  • Moscoso/Vargas make quick work of the Mar/Amaya team by dominating the right-side of the court.
  • In a phenomenal All-Mexican battle, Beltran/Mejia somehow eke it out over Montoya/Salas in a bruising tiebreaker win.
    Semis projection:
  • I think the run of the DLRs ends here: Murray and Martinez are both just too good for the DLRs to overcome, especially with right on right side battles.
  • Beltran and Mejia use their wits and outlast the firepower of Moscoso/Vargas in the other semi.

In the final: I like the Mexican pair to vanquish the upstart Murray/Martinez pair.

Men’s Open Draw
21 teams entered here, including some of the top teams in the world. Lets do a quick preview
In the top half, i see an easy pathway for #1 seeds Murray and Jake Bredenbeck to cruise into the semis. But the 4/5 match-up looks great: recently crowned Bolivian national champs Carlos Keller Vargas and Kadim Carrasco are set to take on one-half of the team they beat in that final two weekends ago in MoMo Zelada, only this weekend Zelada is playing with fellow Formulaflow entreprenuer Mario Mercado . Zelada/Mercado is one tough team, and I think they’ll take out the Bolivian national champs.
In the bottom half, three excellent teams are set to compete. They include the reigning Pan Am games champions in Montoya/Mar, the 2018 PARC champs in Moscoso/Keller and the #2 seeded team of Eduardo Garay Rodriguez and Sebastian Franco . Garay/Franco has a pathway to the semis, but the other two teams must compete in the quarters to get there. Look for Montoya/Mar to vanquish Moscoso/Keller, a rematch of the 2019 Pan Am Games final, so as to reach the semis.
In the semis, I see #1 Murray/Bredenbeck moving into the final over Zelada/Mercado, while in the bottom half I expect the Mexican pair Montoya/Mar to take out #2 Garay/Franco to make the final.

In that final, expect Montoya & Mar to take the title.

Women’s Open Draw
There’s 9 teams here and some intriguing matchups.
In the top half, an all-American match-up of the current USA title-holders Rajsich and Manilla as they take on mDLR and Lotts; this wasn’t quite settled on the court in Des Moines a few weeks back, but the current champs advance nonetheless to face off against the #1 seeds Enriquez/Munoz.
In the bottom half, I see an intriguing semi between Lefty/Righty pairs Parrilla/ Montserrat Pérez and Rivera/Laime. I feel like Rivera & Laime will pull this out.

In the final, Enriquez & Munoz are the favorites.

Can’t wait for the matches this weekend!
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World Singles & Doubles Preview Pt 1

Moscoso is a player to watch this weekend. Photo US Open 2019, Photographer Kevin Savory


Hello all. We are back, and this week coming up we have a massive tournament that has been months in the making in the World Singles & Doubles championships in Denver. More than 300 players are here, and the tournament includes an absolutely massive Men’s IRT draw, and equally huge women’s LPRT pro singles draw, plus the namesake Doubles events that have quickly made this one of the biggest events on the annual racquetball calendar.
Tournament Director and primary sponsor Jim Hiser first put on this event in May of 2018. After a year hiatus, Covid forced the cancellation of the 2020 iteration and months of delays in the 2021 event. But we’re here now, and fans are going to be better for it.
Today we will preview the Men’s and Women’s Pro singles draws, with Doubles previews coming later this week.

R2 Sports App link: https://www.r2sports.com/tourney/home.asp?TID=30515

First, lets preview the Men’s IRT Pro Singles draw.

There are no less than 53 players competing in this draw, the largest non US Open draw we’ve seen in more than a decade on the Men’s tour. 18 of the top 20 players are present, with #20 Gerardo Franco Gonzalez missing (he is rumored to be stepping away from the sport). The other glaring omission here is #1 Kane Waselenchuk, who also missed the Atlanta pro event earlier this year. His absence here will cause additional speculation as to his future in the sport; he continues to play and do clinics with Sudsy Monchik but has not played competitively in an IRT event since March of 2020. But the writing seems to be on the wall; we’ll have to see what happens when the US Open rolls around.

Lets preview the draw. Because of the size of the draw, there are several rounds of qualifying to get into the main round of 32. We even have a handful of round of 256 matches, mostly between players making their IRT debuts.
We’ll start in the round of 128: Here’s some interesting 128 matches to look for:

  • #25 Andres Acuña is the highest seeded player to miss out on a bye into the main draw and gets two extra matches for his troubles; he starts out with an international-flavored match between the winner of Ecuador’s Juan Francisco Cueva and Bolivia’s Hector Barrios.
  • Former Mexican National team member Abraham Peña faces off against Scott McClellan, a tough opener for the IRT’s primary referee and one that could end his tournament quite early.
  • #27 Carlos Keller Vargas, fresh off a double-qualifying Bolivian Nationals tournament, seems set to face Bolivian Junior Adrian Jaldin in his opener. Fly all the way to the USA, play the guy from down the street.
  • #30 Alan Natera Chavez faces a very tricky opener against Texan Ruben Baez, who beat Jake Bredenbeck and nearly topped Bobby Horn in the PAC shootout in Mar 2019. Upset watch here.
  • #34 MoMo Zelada faces a really tough opener in Guatemala’s #1 Javier Martinez.

In the round of 64, some great potential matches:

  • Acuna versus Colombia’s Andres Gomez could be full of fireworks. Gomez is no slouch and Acuna is going to have to work to get into the main draw.
  • Kadim Carrasco projects to face off against Pena, and I think Pena can advance into the main draw. Fatigue may work against the veteran Mexican, but he’s a workout-fiend and should have the fitness to advance.
  • Vargas potentially faces off against former IRT touring pro Nick Riffel in an interesting tactical battle.
  • An interesting all South American battle between Zelada and long-time Colombian national team member Set Cubillos Ruiz could be in play depending on earlier rounds.

Interestingly, I think by and large the 128s are all tougher for these players than their projected 64s to get into the main draw.

Projecting the 32s: here’s some possible matchups, though the depth of this draw could make for some upsets and make these predictions moot:

  • #17 Acuna vs #16 Adam Manilla; an interesting one; Manilla had some breakthrough wins just before the tours had to stop, but so did Acuna. I favor Acuna in my world talent rankings, and i’ll take him here in the upset.
  • #9 Jake Bredenbeck projects to face qualifier Pena in the 32s. Both players hit with a ton of pace, but I don’t believe Pena’s acrobatics will take him past the stronger and younger Jake here.
  • #13 Javier Mar, who always seems to run into tough players during qualifying, projects to take on fellow Mexican qualifier Javier Estrada at this juncture if results hold. And this spells bad news for Mar, because Estrada has beaten him multiple times in the past couple of years. Estrada doesn’t always travel well, but has wins over Mar on home soil plus in two RKT events in the latter part of 2019. I think Estrada wins again here.
  • #14 Thomas Carter projects to face off against Bolivian #2 Vargas at this juncture, and I think Vargas moves past the veteran lefty.
  • #11 Mario Mercado projects to face Natera coming out of the qualifiers, a potential barn burner of a match. Mercado has topped Natera twice in top-level meetings in the past, but I have Natera ranked higher personally. Natera can be hit or miss, with great wins and curious losses … but the same can be said for Mario. I’ll go with the seeded player here.
  • #10 Sebastian Franco set to face qualifier Zelada here … two players who are quite familiar with each other from years of both living near each other in the Baltimore suburbs. Franco is the better player and will be fresher and will move on.
  • #15 Eduardo Garay Rodriguez set to take on #18 Sebastian Fernandez, a potentially awesome match to watch. Fernandez has been stuck right in this 16-18 range for quite a while, and tournament after tournament it seems to bite him with tough match-ups. This time is no different, with Garay coming in hot. A contrast in styles here; Patata plays casual and tactical, while Garay plays balls-out 110% power. Look for Garay to move on here.

Round of 16: I project plenty of upsets in the play-in, so here’s my projected 16s.

  • #1 Alejandro Landa over #17 Acuna: While Acuna topped Landa at PARC a couple years back (a result that led to Landa’s removal from the Pan Am games team and his subsequent defection to the USA…) Landa dominates Acuna when “it counts” on tour. Landa moves on quickly here.
  • #8 Lalo Portillo over #9 Bredenbeck: Lalo has beaten Jake a couple times in the past relatively easily, and should again here.
  • #5 Andree Parrilla vs #12 Montoya: these two have played so many times in the past (they’re the exact same age and traded off Mexican Junior National and World titles for years). Montoya has had the slight upper hand lately at the Mexican Adult and Pro level, including a win over Andree in the Mexican Nationals final earlier this summer. Advantage Rodrigo.
  • #4 Daniel De La Rosa vs Estrada. DLR probably would rather face Estrada versus Mar, but Estrada’s amazing 2019 Black Gold cup win included a h2h win over Daniel. So the history is there, but DLR has turned around his pro career lately and should advance here.
  • #3 Samuel Murray, the champion of the most recent IRT event, should not be troubled by Keller and should move on.
  • #6 Alvaro Beltran projects to face Mercado, a player who he’s faced a number of times both internationally and professionally and should have no trouble advancing past here.
  • #7 Conrrado Moscoso, fresh off another Bolivian national title, set to face #10 Franco. Power versus … more power, and Moscoso should move on here.
  • #2 Rocky Carson, fresh off his 8th US national title, set to face the hard hitting Garay. This is not the match-up Carson would have wanted here; the last time these two played it was an 11-7 gutted out win for Carson, and that was in Mar 2020. Carson is a year older, Garay is a year more experienced. Upset watch here.

Projected Qtrs:

  • Landa over Portillo: Lalo has been playing well, but not well enough to top landa.
  • DLR over Montoya: this could be fantastic match. DLR has two successive pro wins over Rodrigo, but Montoya has some dominant wins over DLR in the past as well. Any given sunday, but for me DLR on the day.
  • Beltran over Murray: yes Murray won the last event and is the #3 seed, but Beltran has never lost to Murray professionally, and most of his wins have been lopsided. Plus, I always pick against Alvaro and its time he gets his due.
  • Moscoso over Carson. Moscoso has played a grand total of 10 IRT tournaments in his life .. and in three of those, he’s taken out Rocky. Well, he’ll make it 4-4 here, as he’ll be on a mission in a Kane-less field to win the title.
    Semis:
  • Landa over DLR: Landa has DLR’s number lately, beating him the last 7 times they’ve played in top level matches that I track. But these matches are often close. There’s little between these guys, but without Kane in the field Landa will be looking to pad his title count.
  • Moscoso over Beltran: Conrrado has topped Alvaro both times they’ve met professionally, but Alvaro the crafty veteran can hang with the hard-hitting Bolivian and make him earn it.

    Finals; Moscoso over Landa: they met in the Bolivian Grand Slam and a streaky Moscoso blanked Landa in the breaker for the win. I think that Conrrado, day in and day out, is the 2nd best talent on the planet and is always a favorite against anyone not named Kane, and i’ll take him here.

LPRT Pro Singles Review


As with the Men, there’s a robust draw of 34 ladies pros this weekend, right in line with the last handful of major events.
Thanks to her duties covering the Olympics for a sport channel in her home country, #1 Paola Longoria is not in Denver. This means a first-even #1 seed for Alexandra Herrera. Other top 20 pros missing include #15 Kelani Lawrence and #16 Adriana Riveros for a pretty solid 17 of top 20 present.
No qualifying here; a straight draw from the 64s onward. Here’s some early round matches to look for:
In the 64s…

  • top Ecuadorian vet Maria Paz Munoz is here (at least, I think that’s who is here), playing in the round of 64 because of having zero points. Its unfortunate she plays into the #1 seed Herrera, because she could have done some damage with the right seeding.
  • Also, welcome back to Ladies pro racquetball Aisling Hickey, who has represented Ireland on the international stage previously.
  • #16/#17 features two top Americans pitted against each other early in Sheryl Lotts and Hollie Scott. Look for Scott to move on.
  • #13 Amaya Cris takes on #20 Susy Acosta in an interesting battle between long-time LPRT touring veterans.
  • #19 Micaela Meneses Cuellar, fresh off her double qualification weekend at the Bolivian Nationals, faces #14 Maria Renee Rodríguez in a really tough opener for both. Meneses can win this match, thought MRR has been steadily improving.
  • #22 Lucia Gonzalez matches up with #11 Nancy Enriquez in a brutal first rounder for both. The last time they met, Gonzalez blasted Enriquez in the 2020 Mexican Nationals. But Enriquez has been playing very strongly since. I have Lucia as one of the top 7-8 players in the world … but she keeps running into top players early in pro draws; can she get a couple of signature wins here?
  • – #15 Brenda Laime Jalil taking on #18 Masiel Rivera Oporto; two players who play frequently and who match up pretty well meet, fittingly, in the 15/18 matchup. I have Rivera slightly ahead of Laime in my personal rankings, but to me this is a tossup.

Some great projected round of 16s here:

  • #1 Herrera should move past #17 Scott, but it might be close.
  • #8 Valeria Centellas should top veteran #9 Rhonda Rajsich, who is in danger of dropping out of the top 10 for the first time in 20 years.
  • #5 Natalia Mendez Erlwein should top #12 Carla Muñoz Montesinos; they’ve met 5 times previously in top-level events and Mendez is 5-0 over the Chilean.
  • #4 Samantha Salas Solis should dominate whoever comes out of the Amaya/Acosta match.
  • #3 Maria Jose Vargas Parada should move past the Bolivian junior Meneses, still playing 18U despite finishing runner-up at their Nationals.
  • #6 Jessica Parrilla ended Gonzalez’ 2020 Mexican Nationals run, and will do so again here. I think Parrilla has a bit too much power and game flexibility for Lucia to handle.
  • #10 Ana Gabriela Martínez over #7 Angelica Barrios – Raquetbolista; an upset by seed, but probably not by talent. last time these two met was at Junior worlds in 2017, a win for Martinez in the RR stage. It is good to see two young players making such inroads to the sport and these two project to be at the top of the sport for years.
  • #2 Montse Mejia should cruise past the winner of the Laime/Rivera match.
    Quarters:
  • I think #8 Centellas can take out #1 Herrera. They’ve never met in a top level event, but i’ve got Valeria slightly ahead of Alexandra in my personal rankings. We’ll see; this is a great test for Herrera, who has managed to avoid frequent match-ups with the young starlets on tour such as Barrios, Centellas and Mejia.
  • #4 Salas just topped #5 Mendez in Kansas City and will do so again.
  • #3 Vargas versus #6 Parrilla; tough one. On paper normally this is Vargas all the way, but she’s still working back from time-off for childbirth. I think Parrilla can take this one.
  • #2 Mejia versus #10 Gaby; for me, the top two players in the world not named Paola, meeting in the quarters. That being said, Mejia has dominated their recent meetings and hasn’t lost to Gaby since 2016 16U worlds. They met in KC a few months back and Mejia dominated in winning 8.6. Mejia tops again.
    Semis:
  • #8 Centellas over #4 Salas; they’ve only met once, a Salas win a few years back, but that was before Salas hit her rough patch of form. Centellas has ascended since and is in a prime spot to make the final.
  • #2 Mejia over Parrilla; the two Mexican rivals have met several times in the past, with Leoni winning all of them, including a big upset at the 2020 Mexican Nationals, but that was before Mejia found her current gear. She topped four of the world’s best in order in straight games to win in KC, and she won’t be stopped here.

Finals: a rematch of the KC round of 16 that Mejia won handily 9,8 happens in the final, and Mejia takes her second straight LPRT title.

Who is Streaming this weekend? The IRT crew Dean DeAngelo Baer and Pablo Fajre are heading to Denver to stream this weekend, so stay tuned to the IRT feed for all your streaming options.


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.
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2021 TeamRoot SuperMax Wrap-Up

Mejia captures her first ever pro tournament, doing the double along with it. Photo Kevin Savory US Open 2019

Congrats to your winners on the weekend:

  • Pro Singles: Montse Mejia
  • Pro Doubles; Mejia & Alexandra Herrera​

Mejia gets just her second ever win over Longoria to take her first ever pro title. She becomes the 28th person ever to win a Tier 1 women’s pro event. She also breaks Longoria’s 39-match winning streak, the 7th longest in the history of the sport on the women’s side.

R2 Sports App home page for event: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=37491

Lets review the notable matches in the Singles draw.

Match report in PRS: http://rball.pro/DD7F6B

In the 64s, some surprises starting right at 8am Friday:

  • Solid win for Colombian María Paz Riquelme, taking out the junior upstart from Bolivia Natalia Mita. Fun fact about Riquelme; she got her start playing racquetball when she lived in Arlington Va, and she used to play in the leagues that I ran as a club pro there in the 2006-2007 time frame. I don’t think i can take all the credit for her success though 🙂
  • Annie Roberts had a great turn-around to notch her first LPRT win, storming back from a 15-8 first game loss to take the second game 15-0 and then hold on for the 11-10 tie-breaker win over Colombian junior Camila Rivero
  • Erika Manilla took a close one from fellow American Michelle De La Rosa3,11 to move on.

In the 32s, the notable results

  • #16 Adriana Riveros dominated #17 @Maria Maria Renee Rodríguez 4,11 to move on. I would have expected this to be closer; a solid win by Riveros.
  • #8 Angelica Barrios​ made quick work of #25 Daniela Rico​ 10,2; they had gone deep into a tie-breaker in the last event when they met.
  • #12 @Carla Carla Muñoz Montesinos and #21 Masiel Rivera Oporto (a former top10 player herself) played it as close as you could, with Munoz edging out the Bolivian-American 11-10 in a fantastic back and forth, tense match.
  • #11 Nancy Enriquez​ dominated the tough Ana Laura Flores​ 6,6 in the opener.
  • #20 Brenda Laime Jalil​ got the biggest upset of the round, topping Colombian veteran Amaya Cris in two.
  • #10 Montse Mejia​ cruised past Bolivian junior @Micaela Micaela Meneses Cuellar​ 8,4 to start off her tournament.
  • In the most talent-laden opening round match, #7 Valeria Centellas played very solid racquetball to move past the criminally under-seeded #26 Lucia Gonzalez 12,7.
  • #15 Kelani Lawrence​ and fellow American Sheryl Lotts played it as close as they could, with Kelani taking an 11-10 tie-breaker.
  • #2 Alexandra Herrera was given a stiff challenge, advancing by 10,14 in two close games against Manilla.

In the 16s:

  • #1 Paola Longoria​ cruised past #16 Riveros to move on.
  • #8 Barrios took care of business against the veteran #9 Rhonda Rajsich,9.
  • #5 Samantha Salas Solis​ left no room for an upset over #12 Munoz, who has challenged her (and beaten her) in the past. She moves on 7,7
  • #4 Natalia Mendez​ handled the upstart #20 Laime, controlling the match and moving on.
  • #14 Gabriela Martinez​ took out #3 @Maria Maria Jose Vargas Parada with relative ease 3,7. This was a tough round of 16 for Vargas, just coming back after a break, having to go against the under-seeded Gaby. This sets up some possibly very compelling matches later on in the bottom half.
  • #6 Jessica Parrilla​ turned the tides on the surging #11 Enriquez, and showed some serious mettle in coming back to win game two and the match. She moves on 7,14
  • #10 Mejia got a solid win over #7 Centellas 9,8, in a match of two of the better young players on tour.
  • #2 Herrera withstood a tough opening game, then cruised to the win 14,1 over Lawrence.

In the Quarters

  • Barrios got her points and definitely played better than the last time she met #1 Longoria, but Paola persevered and moved on 8,10.
  • #5 Salas got a great win over #4 Mendez, turning the tide from their last meeting in South Carolina and buldling on her solid showing at Mexican Nationals. Is Salas back? This win should put her back to #4 on tour going into the next event.
  • #14 Martinez continued her pathway through the draw, topping #6 Parrilla in two relatively in-control games. Is Martinez back? Clearly she’s one of the top 4-5 players in the world, and the tour would be better with her on it full time.
  • #10 Mejia held serve against her doubles partner and moved into the semis over #2 Herrera in two closer games. Its always tough to play your doubles partner, and the two know each other’s games intimately. Mejia moves on for a compelling semi final.

In the Semis

  • Longoria improved to an amazing 52-3 against her long-time rival Salas, topping her 7,6 to move into the finals of the 25th consecutive LPRT event.
  • Mejia topped Martinez 8,6 for the fourth successive time in major/pro competitions to move into just her second ever pro final.

In the Finals, which some pundits (ahem, me) predicted, Mejia took it to Longoria in a way she hadn’t done since her sole previous victory over the #1, and kept up the pressure all game for the two-game win.

Points Implications of results:

The big move, of course, is Mejia, who should move from #10 to #3 with this big win. That is assuming that there’s no rolling expiration of points going on and we’re just adding existing points to the current totals for each player. It will be the first time Mejia has been anywhere close to the top of the LPRT rankings, where she really belongs based on her talent level.

Other minor moves in the rankings that i’m projecting include:

  • Mendez dropping from 4 to 6
  • Centellas dropping out of the top 8.
  • Martinez moving up from 13 to 11.
  • Laime moving up 2 spots to 18.

Doubles review

Match report in the PRS database: http://rball.pro/27A5B6

Round of 16: two minor upsets in the 8/9 and 7/10 matches, other wise seeds held.

In the quarters, all four top seeds held serve, but it wasn’t easy; three of the four matches went to tie-breaker and the top seeds were stretched 9,10 by the American duo of Lawrence & Scott.

In the semis; a shot across the bow of ladies pro doubles; the Guatemalan national team of Martinez & Rodriguez handled the #1 Longoria/Salas team to move into their first pro doubles final as a team. On the bottom-half, Mejia & Herrera moved into the final as well, easily handling the Argentine duo of Mendez/Centellas.

In the final: the Mexican duo made quick work of the Guatemalans in game one, then held on 15-14 in game two to give Mejia the shock double on the weekend. Final score 1,14.

Women’s Open draw

There was a very solid women’s open draw on the weekend as well, which featured 18 players and was headlined by #7 and #8 players Barrios and Centellas as well as several former top 10 pro players.

The semis nearly went chalk, with 4 of the top 5 seeds advancing, all regular LPRT touring pros. Erin Slutzky had the biggest upset of the early rounds, taking out #4 Amaya Cris 11-10 before falling to #5 Enriquez easily in the quarters.

In the semis, four countries represented: Bolivia, Mexico, Chile and Argentina. A very international semis.

  • Barrios got a solid tiebreaker win over Enriquez.
  • Munoz got one of the better wins of her career by topping Centellas in 2.

In the final, Munoz finished off Barrios in two to capture the crown and finish off a significant weekend of results. She finishes atop the open draw with a series of wins over top 8 players and wins a draw that included at least 4 current or very recent top 10 players. Great weekend for the Chilean.

Thanks for all the streaming on the weekend, especially from broadcasters Timothy Baghurst​, Jerry J Josey Jr.​., and Tj Baumbaugh​. Thanks to Leo Ray Vasquez​ for his weekend broadcast work as well. Lastly thanks to Sudsy Monchik​, who was in KC with his wife for the event and who did a great job broadcasting as always. I’d like to say that the streaming video quality looked really amazing this weekend, more “high def” than I’d seen it before, and the broadcast team did a great job of live action camera switching. Bravo and kudos to the entire tech team of LPRT.

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 on the Racquetball Calendar?

  • Next weekend there’s an RKT event in Chihuahua.
  • The next big tournament is the Outdoor Nationals in Huntington Beach, CA the weekend of 7/11/21.
  • The weekend after that will be the US Team Qualifying plus Junior Nationals in Des Moines.
  • The next known LPRT event is the combo IRT/LPRT World Doubles event in mid-august in Denver.

tags

LPRT​
International Racquetball Federation – IRF​
USA Racquetball​
@Federación Mexicana de Raquetbol
RKT​
Raquetbol Bolivia​
Federación Boliviana de Racquetball​ de Racquetball
Racquetball Colombia​
@Federación Chilena de Racquetball
@Racquetball Rancagua, Chile
@ASOCIACION DE RAQUETBOL DE GUATEMALA
Reaching Your Dream Foundation​oundation
Randy Root​

Hashtags #racquetball #proracquetball #outdoorracquetball #irt #lprt #wor

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TeamRoot SuperMax Preview

The LPRT is back in action, and back in Kansas City for the fourth time in three years. Thanks to major LPRT benefactor Randy Root and Teamroot.com for running his 4th grand slam and for his ongoing support of the sport (both pros and outdoor).

R2 Sports App link: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=37491

36 of the top women’s pros from around the world are here competing representing 7 different countries.

Top20 players missing: None. For the first time that I can think of writing these previews, there’s not a single top20 ranked player missing from a pro event. The highest ranked players missing are #22 Erin Nocam Rivera and #23 Susy Acosta, neither of whom are full time tour players at this point. So this should be a fantastic draw.

Big news: the return of #3 Maria Jose Vargas Parada, who took time off the tour for the birth of her second child. She’s back, and it should be interesting to see how rusty she is when it comes to competing in the back-end of this event.

Round of 64
36 players means a round of 32 in Overland park; here’s a quick look at the compelling play-in matches:

  • #32/33 Linda Tyler versus Montserrat Pérez; Tyler got a great win in the last LPRT event opener; this matchup projects to be a bit tougher.
  • A couple of international juniors have flown in to make their pro debuts. Bolivia’s Natalia Mita and Colombia’s Camila Rivero are both 16U players and will provide tough matchups for María Paz Riquelme and Annie Roberts respectively.

– The 31/34 match is a bruiser; 2020 US National team qualifier Erika Manilla is set to face former touring pro and current top outdoor specialist Michelle De La Rosa. One top American will bow out quite early here, and I suspect it will be Manilla.

Round of 32 matches to watch for: Here’s some of the openers that I think will be compelling:

  • 16/17 features two touring veterans in Adriana Riveros and @maria renee rodriguez, who have only managed to face off once before in a top-level event despite both competing on tour for years. Riveros topped MRR in 2016, but things are a lot closer between them now. I still slightly favor Riveros here, but MRR should push for the win.
  • #8 Angelica Barrios vs #25 Daniela Rico: these two managed to play in the first round just a few weeks ago, with Rico pushing Barrios to a breaker. No reason not to think it could happen again.
  • #13 Amaya Cris will have her hands full with #20 Brenda Laime Jalil; upset watch here.
  • #14 @ana gabriela martinez vs #19 Hollie Scott; these two played a barn burner in December, with Scott pushing the former World Champ to a breaker before falling. Lets see if the USA #1 can push the Guatemalan #1 here, in the kind of international matchup that Scott will be seeing later this year at Worlds.
  • #7 Valeria Centellas vs #26 Lucia Gonzalez; another repeat of a 1st rounder from early may, where Centellas topped the dangerous Lucia in two solid games. Gonzalez skipped Mexican Nationals last week, perhaps to rest up for the super max. Despite the seedings of both players, these are (in my estimation) 2 of the top 6-7 players in the world, and this is the best round of 32 in terms of talent.
  • #10 Montse Mejia vs #23 Micaela Meneses Cuellar; a tough draw for the young Bolivan, running into perhaps the 2nd or 3rd best player in the world right now in Mejia.
  • #15 Kelani Lawrence vs #18 @sheryl lotts; another USA vs USA match, with Lawrence favored to down her some-times doubles partner.

– #2 Alexandra Herrera vs mDLR: if Michelle advances, Herrera has a far more difficult round of 32 than she may like. These two played a 12-10 5th game at the US Open a couple years ago, and mDLR can push the lefty. Herrera should advance, but will have to work for it.

Round of 16 projections.
-#1 Paola Longoria should dominate the veteran Riveros.

  • I see #8 Barrios taking out #9 veteran Rhonda Rajsich.
  • After several years entrenched at #2 on tour, Samantha Salas Solis has fallen to #5, but had a great run at Mexican Nationals last week, getting wins over several tough compatriots, and will look to build on that here. She gets an opponent in #12 Carla Muñoz Montesinos who upset Salas in Dec 2019, so she has the playbook to win, but i like the way Salas is trending. Samantha to advance.
  • #4 Natalia Mendez over Laime.
  • #3 Vargas projects to play #14 Martinez in a really tough round of 16, especially given her time off. Based on talent levels, this should be a close one for Vargas, but she could be rusty from the layoff. I like the winner of this match to make a deep run.
  • #11 Nancy Enriquez just beat #6 Jessica Parrilla last week at Mexican Nationals handily, and I think she does it again here.
  • #10 Mejia over #7 Centellas; man this quarter is tough; Centellas, Lucia Gonzalez and Mejia are basically 3 of the top 6 players in my personal rankings, and they all play into one quadrant of one quarter in this draw. Mejia has not lost to Valeria before and should advance here.

– #2 Herrera over #15 Lawrence: Herrera takes out her second successive American.

Projected Qtrs:

  • #1 Longoria over #8 Barrios; a rematch of the shock final in the Dec 2020 supermax event, which rocketed Angelica to the top 8 on tour. Paola makes quick work of the young Bolivian player here.
  • #4 Mendez over #5 Salas: these two met in the quarters of the Sweet Caroline and Natalia dominated. Despite Salas’ excellent run in Mexico, Mendez is playing too tough right now and advances.
  • #11 Enriquez loses to Vargas, despite playing in top form.
  • #10 Mejia tops #2 Herrera to give Alexandra her earliest exit for a while. I think Mejia is either the 2nd or 3rd best player in the world, and she’ll get a chance to prove it here.
    Semis:
  • #1 Longoria over #4 Mendez; Paola is 5-0 lifetime over the Argentine.
  • #10 Mejia over #3 Vargas; at full strength i give Vargas the edge here, but with the layoff, Mejia gets the edge
    Finals;

– Longoria takes out Mejia once again in the final of a big event for the title.

Doubles review
16 teams competing in a full 16 draw. the #1 team of Longoria/Salas has won dozens of titles together now; they should advance to the final from the top bracket over the Guatemalan team of Martinez/MRR, who have been playing amazingly well together as of late. Don’t count out the US national doubles champ team of Lawrence/Scott, or the Colombian national team of Amaya/Riveros though.
From the bottom, somehow despite constantly making pro finals, Herrera/Mejia are still not seeded 2nd. No matter; the bottom half of this draw is not nearly as stacked as the top half, and the Mexicans should meet and beat the Argentine national doubles team of Mendez/Centellas in the semis to make for another all-Mexican final.

Look for Longoria/Salas to win and give Paola another double.

Look for Streaming in the regular places; follow the LPRT on facebook and sign up to get notifications when they go Live. Look for Timothy Baghurst, Jerry J Josey Jr.., and Tj Baumbaugh on the mike, 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 FB. If your name is here and it isn’t tagged … it probably means I attempted to tag you but FB stripped it.
Tags
LPRT
International Racquetball Federation – IRF
USA Racquetball
@Federación Mexicana de Raquetbol
@Federación Boliviana De Raquetbol – Febora
Federación Boliviana de Racquetball de Racquetball
Racquetball Colombia
@Federacion Colombiana de Racquetball
@Asociación Argentina de Racquetball
@federación Chilena Racquetball
Racquetball Rancagua, Chile
@ASOCIACION DE RAQUETBOL DE GUATEMALA
Hashtags #racquetball #proracquetball #outdoorracquetball #irt #lprt #worTeamRTeamr

Posted on

2021 Sweet Caroline LPRT Grand Slam Pro-Am Wrap-up

Longoria keeps on winning. Photo via US Open 2019, Kevin Savory

Congrats to your winners on the weekend:

  • Pro Singles: Paola Longoria
  • Pro Doubles: Paola Longoria & Samantha Salas
    The 101st career tier-1 or higher singles win for Longoria (107 overall including satellites). And this is the 33rd pro doubles title for the Salas/Longoria pairing since we started tracking ladies pro doubles data in 2014. Amazing.

R2 Sports App home page for event: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=37154

Lets review the notable matches in the Singles draw.

Singles Match report in the PRS database: http://rball.pro/C41F20

In thee 64s: Just three matches in the early days, but an opening barn-burner as Texan Linda Tyler, who drove 13 hours the day before the match to get an 8am start time, downed Bolivian vet Jenny Daza Navia in an 11-10 back and forth match.

In the 32s, here were the notable and upset matches:

  • In the 16/17 match, Kelani Lawrence showed no signs of rust and came out blazing against her USA top rival Hollie Scott. Lawrence raced to a huge early lead in game one, held on to take that game, then chipped away at Scott in game two to advance 11,7.
  • #8 Valeria Centellas made a statement in topping dark-horse favorite Lucia Gonzalez in strong fashion 11,9. Centellas has added a power component to her game that should let her really challenge the players ranked above her, and did not let the dangerous Gonzalez get the upset here.
  • #5 Rhonda Rajsich made fast work of 19-yr old Shane Diaz, playing in just her 2nd pro tournament.
  • #12 Nancy Enriquez put on a serving clinic and blasted #21 Ana Laura Flores 4,3. Enriquez mixed up her serves, using deadly jam serves and devastating drive serves to blow past a dangerous 1st round opponent in Flores and advance.
  • #4 Angelica Barrios – Raquetbolista was pushed in her opener against Daniela Rico before advancing in a tie-breaker. 14,(12),3.
  • #19 Brenda Laime Jalil got the upset over her country-woman Adriana Riveros 11,11 in what might portend to be a changing of the guard in Colombian racquetball. Amaya and Riveros have long been 1-2 in Colombian racquetball heirarchy; Laime is looking to break into that grouping to represent the country at the next Int’l event.
  • In the 15/18 match, Sheryl Lotts saved match points against and came back from 0-6 in the breaker to beat Maria Renee Rodríguez in the best match of the round. Final score (12),14,8. Really very little between these two players on the day and a shame one had to lose.
  • – #2 Alexandra Herrera made fast work of #31 Erika Manilla, a match many thought would be closer.

In the 16s:

  • #1 Paola Longoria got a scare in game two, as Lawrence raced out to a huge early lead, but reeled her back in and advanced in two games over Kelani 5,13.
  • #8 Centellas got her second solid win in a row, downing touring veteran Chilean Carla Muñoz Montesinos10,9.
  • #12 Enriquez continues to look rejuvenated after easing past #5 Rajsich in two easy games 7,6.
  • #13 Montse Mejia took out the Kansas City finalist Barrios in two close games 12,14. The last time these two met was the semis of 2018 World 18U Juniors, and these two (along with Martinez) represent a golden generation for women’s racquetball.
  • #3 Samantha Salas Solis eased past a tough #19 Laime 14,9.
  • #6 Natalia Mendez continues to get statement wins, this time downing reigning World Champ Ana Gabriela Martínez 7,10. Mendez clearly has a new approach in the service box and has some added pace; her projected quarter will be telling.
  • #7 Jessica Parrilla] played the round’s only tiebreaker, advancing past veteran Colombian Amaya Cris 11-8.
  • – #2 Herrera downed her second American in a row, moving past #18 Lotts in two.

In the Quarters

  • Longoria dominated Centellas 2,6. Longoria played bottom board over and over and the young Argentine could do little to stop her.
  • Mejia outlasted her countrywoman Enriquez, splitting the first two games then running away in the breaker. 14,(13),1. Enriquez has made a big statement in this event.
  • Speaking of statements, Mendez ran past Salas 7,6 to advance to just her 5th career semi final. Whatever she’s been doing during the pandemic, its working.
  • Herrera dodged a bullet and took out her countrywoman Parrilla in a tiebreaker. Score 7,(14),3. Herrera continues her steady-eddie pace and advances to another semi.

In the Semis, both promising match-ups turned out to be two game blowouts.

  • Longoria downed her erstwhile rival Mejia for the Mexican #1 crown 4,7. It has now been more than two years since Mejia’s famous win over Longoria in the 2019 Mexico National finals, and Longoria has been dominating their matchups of late. Mejia needs to regain her mojo from that final and figure out a pathway forward if she wants to break through.
  • Herrera cruised past Mendez 6,8. Mendez’ fantastic tourney run ends, and Herrera proves the doubters wrong by living up to her seed and advancing to her 5th career final.

In the Finals, Longoria and Herrera played a back and forth first game, but then Paola ran way in the second to take the title 12,3.

Points Implications of results
Thanks to the lack of pro events, when this tournament posts we’re set to have some pretty wholesale changes at the top unless the LPRT decides to persist some tournament points or go to a longer term before retiring points. But, assuming we’re staying with a 12-month rolling calendar, here’s what the rankings will look like after these results:

  • Herrera moves to #2
  • Barrios will move up to #3
  • Mendez will jump to #4, all three career highs
  • Mejia jumps from 14 to 6, much more in line with her true talent level.
  • Gaby Martinez jumps from 11 to 7.
  • Salas drops from 4 to 8, which may not be in line with her true talent level but is indicative of her performance lately in pro events.
  • Rhonda drops from 6 to 12, which would be the lowest she’s been ranked professionally since 1999.
  • Vargas drops from 2 all the way to 13 thanks to missing this event.

Which would make the top 8 seeds in the next event go like this: Longoria, Herrera, Barrios, Mendez, Parrilla, Mejia, Martinez, Salas. Which puts Mejia and Longoria on opposite sides of the draw.

Doubles review
Match report in the PRS database: http://rball.pro/C0E57E
A healthy doubles draw featured 15 teams and some great match-ups. The 16s had several tie-breakers, including an 11-10 win for the American duo of Rajsich/Lotts over Laime/Gonzalez.
The quarters featured the all-American team of Rajsich/Scott taking a game off the #1 team but losing. The Guatemalan national team cruised into the semis. The #2 Mexicans were dominant in games 1 and 3 but took game two off in advancing, and the USA #1 team of Scott/Lawrence took out the Argentine national team in an upset.
In the semis, it was Mexico over Guatemala in one side (though the improving Guatemalan team stretched the #1 seeds to 11-9 before falling) and Mexico over USA in the other to setup another all Mexican final.

In that final, a final seen more and more on tour, we saw Longoria/Salas taking out Mejia/Herrera in two quick games.

Other Major Draws:

  • Women’s Open featured a 12-person draw with some interesting results between touring pros outside the top 10. In the final, we saw Micaela Meneses Cuellar take out Manilla in the final. Meneses turned 17 just a couple of months ago and took out three solid pros en route to the title.

– Men’s Open was very entertaining; 25 players from everywhere from Mexico to Maryland duked it out. In the final IRT top8 player Lalo Portillo took out the #2 seed from Maryland MoMo Zelada in two games. Portillo blew through this draw, never giving up more than 8 points in a game all weekend.

Thanks for all the streaming on the weekend, especially from broadcasters Timothy Baghurst, Jerry J Josey Jr., and Tj Baumbaugh, along with JT R Ball who flew in from California to help out with streaming and broadcasting. Great job all; it was a grueling broadcast schedule.
Thanks to the Tourney Directors Josey and Jacob Vargueuse for putting this event on!

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.

Next up?

This coming weekend is an RKT event in Chihuahua that should be interesting. The NMRA has its Nationals in St Louis. The next LPRT event is Teamroot super max is June 20th.

tags
LPRT
USA Racquetball
Federación Mexicana de Raquetbol
RKT
Federación Boliviana De Raquetbol – Febora- Febora
Federación Boliviana de Racquetball
Racquetball Colombia
Federacion Colombiana de Racquetball
Asociación Argentina de Racquetball
Federación Chilena Racquetball
Racquetball Rancagua, Chile, Chile
ASOCIACION DE RAQUETBOL DE GUATEMALA
Reaching Your Dream Foundation
Formulaflow
Hashtags #racquetball #proracquetball #outdoorracquetball #irt #lprt #wor

Posted on

2021 Sweet Caroline LPRT Grand Slam Pro-Am Preview

Welcome back pro racquetball fans! We have not had a full tier pro event since early January, and the ladies have not had a full pro event since early December 2020, so we’re more than due.

r2sports link for event: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=37154

There’s a huge draw of pro ladies in South Carolina this weekend; 35 players signed up, the largest ladies pro draw since the 2019 US Open. #1 Paola Longoria is the defending champ here, having won the Jan 2020 event over #2 Maria Jose Vargas Parada. We won’t have a rematch this year, since Vargas recently gave birth to her second child and is on a playing hiatus.

The top 8 features one relatively new name: Angelica Barrios is currently ranked 5th, seeded 4th, thanks to her break-through performance in December’s Kansas City grand slam. The pandemic has really wreaked havoc on the tour rankings, making single event results even more magnified in importance.

The rest of the draw is stacked, missing just 2 players out of the world’s top 20 (Vargas and #19 Masiel Rivera Oporto).

Lets preview the draw, which was released late Wednesday night in an online reaction event, a great idea from the LPRT and commissioner Tj Baumbaugh.

Play starts with a few round of 64 matches.

  • Bolivian veteran #32 Jenny Daza Navia makes a rare pro appearance, and faces Texas amateur #33 Linda Tyler.
  • Former Mexican junior national champ #35 Montserrat Pérez takes on another former Mexican Jr National champ in #30 Naomi Ros. Ros was the 2018 Junior world champ in 12U, putting her in her age 15 season, while Perez won the Mexican 18Us in 2015.
  • #34 Costa Rican Maricruz Ortiz, the reigning world 16U world junior champ, takes on a drastically under-seeded #31 Erika Manilla, who made the US Team qualifying event final in Feb 2020 in her last competitive event.

Projecting the 32s: Here’s some of the round of 32 matches that I think may be interesting and/or competitive:

  • #16/#17: I frequently note that these 16/17 and 15/18 matches are always tough, and this one will be the same. #16 Hollie Scott takes on #17 Kelani Lawrence, who have met in the last three major US Team qualifying/Nationals events. Kelani took out Scott in the 2018 Nationals en route to a finals loss, then they played an amazing 2019 final with Lawrence edging Scott 11-10 to take the title, then met up in the 2020 qualifier in the semis, where Scott took out Kelani on the way to the title her self. Lawrence is now seemingly recovered from the eye injury she suffered in Las Vegas in September, but I’m predicting Scott to take this one.
  • #9 Carla Muñoz Montesinos vs #24 Graci Wargo; the newly matriculated Junior Floridian Wargo faces a tough early test from the newlywed Munoz, who now has a pretty solid regular training partner in husband Alan Natera Chavez.
  • #25 Lucia Gonzalez v #8 Valeria Centellas; Wow, what a first round match up this is. Centellas raced into prominence partly thanks to her results at this event last January and has maintained her top10 presence since. But Gonzalez might be the best player in the world outside of Frederique Lambert who does not tour regularly and routinely takes out LPRT top 10 players when she does compete. I like picking upsets and I’ll go with Lucia here.
  • #12 Nancy Enriquez vs #21 Ana Laura Flores; long-time top10 player Enriquez faces a tricky opener against the youngster Flores, who beat Scott and barely lost to Rajsich in her last pro appearance in March 2020.
  • #20 Susy Acosta makes an appearance in her 23rd straight season, but likely falls to her countrywoman #13 Montse Mejia.
  • Its Colombia v Colombia in #14 Adriana Riveros vs #19 Brenda Laime Jalil. Last time they played, it was Sept 2019 and Laime advanced, and I’ll go with the upset again here.
  • #11 Ana Gabriela Martínez takes on 17yr old Bolivian Micaela Meneses Cuellar in what could be a close opener.
  • The always competitive 15/18 match should be interesting; #15 Maria Renee Rodríguez takes on #18 Sheryl Lotts. These two met in this same tourney last year, a come-from behind win for Lotts. In fact, they’ve met 5 times at pro or international events and it has always gone tiebreaker. Lotts owns the career 4-1 advantage and i’ll predict she advances.
  • #2 Alexandra Herrera, who gets a career high seeding here, likely faces one heck of a challenge in #31 Manilla. These two have never met, but Manilla has proven herself to be able to hang with top players. Herrera is normally a model of consistency, rarely taking early round upsets and playing to her seeding … but she’s going to have to work for this win.

round of 16: Lots of tough openers, but if my predictions hold here’s your projected 16s:

  • #1 Paola Longoria v #16 Scott: Mexico’s #1 versus USA’s #1; Longoria advances but Scott gets some more experience against the best.
  • #25 Gonzalez over #8 Munoz: if Lucia can beat Centellas, she can beat Munoz.
  • #12 Enriquez over #5 Rhonda Rajsich; last time they met was a 3-game win for Nancy and I’m guessing it’ll be the same here.
  • #13 Mejia over #4 Barrios: despite the rankings, I think Mejia is perhaps the 3rd or 4th best player in the world. These two met in the finals of World 18U two years running in 2017 and 2018, both times a two-game win for the Mexican. Barrios had a heck of a run in Kansas City but falls here.
  • #3 Samantha Salas Solis overpowers #19 Laime
  • #6 Natalia Mendez over #11 Martinez: last time these two met was in the 2019 PARC, a Mendez career win. Mendez seems to have added some depth to her game and may be playing more than Martinez. When both are training full time the edge goes to Gaby, but right now i give the Argentinian the edge.
  • #7 Jessica Parrilla takes out #10 Cristina Amaya Cassino in a battle of two long-time pros.
  • #2 Herrera takes out her second straight top American player by advancing past #18 Lotts.

Projected Qtrs:

  • #1 Longoria over #25 Gonzalez: the run of Lucia ends here.
  • #13 Mejia over #12 Enriquez; Mejia has won their last few meetings.
  • #3 Salas over #6 Mendez: Salas has never lost to Mendez, but they also have not played in years. This could be close based on recent form of both players.
  • #7 Parrilla over #2 Herrera: they have not played since Dec 2019, when Jessica was still coming back from her knee injury, but they were always close. I think this could be the big breakthrough for Parrilla.
    Interestingly, I’ve predicted 7 of the 8 quarterfinalists to be Mexican. A great depiction of just how dominant that country has become on the ladies circuit.
    Semis:
  • Longoria over Mejia; One day Montse will break through with another win over Paola, but for now Paola rules.
  • Parrilla over Salas: if Jessica can beat Herrera, she can beat Salas in a power-for-power match

Finals: Longoria over Parrilla.

Doubles Preview:

15 teams in the doubles (odd since there’s 35 singles players entered), but it definitely features several international flavor teams as IRF countries start to think about the Worlds and PARC event coming up later this year.

The world’s best ladies pro doubles team is back together in Longoria/Salas; they’re the #1 seeds. They seem likely to face the Guatemalan #1 team of Gonzalez/Rodriguez in the top semis.

On the bottom, the #2 seeds are the new Argentine national team of Mendez/Centellas. They’ll face a tough quarter against the USA #1 team of Lawrence/Scott but look like underdogs against the strong Mexican team of Meija/Herrera.

I’ll predict a frequently seen final between the two top Mexican teams of Longoria/Salas v Mejia/Herrera. The veterans have taken the last 4 meetings against their countrymates, and i’ll go with Longoria getting the double here.

Look for Streaming in the regular places; follow the LPRT on Facebook and sign up to get notifications when they go Live. Look for Timothy Baghurst, Jerry J Josey Jr., and Baumbaugh on the mike, calling the shots!

Thanks to the Tourney Directors Jerry J Josey Jr. & Jacob.k.varughese for putting this event on!

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