VegasTennis.com wins Districts and Sectionals

By Ryan Wolfington                                                                                   Click  see pictures

I decided to put together a mixed doubles team to compete at this falls League. The VegasTennis.com 3.0 mixed team is now established with Janet Spelman,  Leonard Fath, Noel Irwin, Patti Chess,  Jonathan Pruneda, Eric Alm,  Tina Felps and Shelleye Warner. Janet and her partner Shelleye Warner won the Stacy Darling tournament and many of the other  men were all semifinalists at Jill Gaynor.. But that is not why I asked them. Each person I have seen play and participate in Las Vegas tennis and with class. To me a winner is those who win the inner game,  maintaining dignity on the court. And each of these players falls into that category.  

DANCE THROUGH DISTRICTS....

Friday Night Tennis...Match 1......Team VegasTennis.com went  against TEAM Lorenzi in the 3.0 Fall Mixed League Round Robin event this past weekend at UNLV. This season, the winner of the round Robin goes to sectionals, which is also at UNLV in November.  In the 3.0 category, there were only our two teams.  

Friday night Carey Reno, who's maiden name is "Curnutt, showed up with her parents, who also are very active in local tennis, along with her sister, Mindy. Mindy and Carey are both on this 3.0 team and Carey is the captain.

I am the captain of the VegasTennis.com team. I noticed the unique opportunity of having a "Sectionals" in Las Vegas and decided to put a team together with VegasTennis.com as the name. Yet the players come from many different clubs.

The fans included Don Curnutt, who is Mindy and Carey Reno's father. He is on two city championship teams, the senior 3.5 men's and the Mixed doubles 3.5 team that is headed to "Regionals" next month. They watched and cheered as their daughter captained her team. But tonight it was my Team, VegasTennis.com that swept it 3-0, with some excellent play on both sides. On court one Janet Spelman and Eric Alm played Susan Hodges and Mike Burroughs. Susan happens to be the captain of the ladies 3.5 Red Rock team that Janet plays for; tonight they were opponents. Janet also plays on Red Rocks 3.0 team and Lorenzi's 3.5 team. Eric also plays on the city championship 3.0 team at Lorenzi. In fact, although Carey Reno's  team name is Lorenzi, my team, VegasTennis.com has more players that play on a Lorenzi League team then there's. 

  Eric Alm has played singles in the past but had no problem adjusting his game to the doubles format. He just recently played in the Red Rock tournament, playing up to 3.5.  It took two sets for Janet and Eric to win, giving TEAM VegasTennis.com it's first point. They beat Susan Hodges and Mike Burroughs 6-2, 6-3. 

Then on court three was Noel Irwin and Patti Chess verses K.C. Scherrer and Chris Arambula.  K.C. is the before mentioned Susan Hodges daughter. Patti and Noel were able to give VegasTennis.com it's second win of the night, with an incredible come back taking the second set 6-2, after losing the first 4-6. Then they won the tie breaker 10-4. At the net Volleying extremely well was Patti Chess. In tennis, the key is keeping the ball in play, and this she did perfectly. And it was Noel who made the key points to win the tie breaker. This win gives VegasTennis.com Friday nights victory.

* Winner in Orange

 The format is simple, 3 mixed doubles matches per day. The team that wins two out of the three, wins that day's event. Then, the team that wins two out of three days wins. To add to Friday's win,  Leonard Fath and Shelleye Warner won the third match as well against Mindy Curnutt and Ray Payan 6-4, 7-5. This was an extremely close match, as were most of them during the whole event.

 Mindy Curnutt plays for Lorenzi's Ladies  3.5.  Leonard Fath also plays for the 3.5 men's City Championship team at Lorenzi, and he just won the recent Jill Gaynor tournament. Shelleye Warner, his partner also just won the Red Rock tournament in the doubles with Janet Spelman. In fact these ladies have won the last 5 3.0 doubles tournaments they have entered. They are both dangerous at the net, often punishing opponents with their overheads.

Watching this evenings events were tennis mainstay's Prinya and Sally Tipmongkol. Prinya and Sally just took second place , the Silver, in the Senior Olympics, and Prinya took the Gold medal in doubles, playing down a couple age groups to win it against the 50-54 year olds. He was in charge of running the event as well. But even after doing that all day, he came to watch the mixed league round robin. His involvement with tennis goes beyond his play, as he is also on the board at The Nevada Tennis Association, a volunteer position that one is voted into.

Saturday Tennis...Match 2

Up one to zero, TEAM VegasTennis.com met up against Lorenzi once again Saturday morning, but found Shelleye Warner's back fit to be tied. She could not move enough to play tennis. So Janet Spelman called on her other doubles partner, Tina Felps. Tina and Janet played at Desert Palm together and they went undefeated in over 13 straight matches in league play.

On court two Janet Spelman and Eric Alm played Mindy Curnutt in what turned out to be an extremely close match. After winning the first set 6-1, Janet and Eric fell behind in the second set, losing it 3-6. Mindy went on fire in the later part of the second set and there was no stopping this team at that point. 

The tie breaker was as good as it gets, with Mindy and Mike up early, and holding a lead until Eric and Janet went up 7-6. Then tie 8-8. Then Janet and Eric got two keys points winning the first match of the day 6-1, 3-6, 1-0(10-8). 

Now it was up to the other two matches. Noel Irwin and Patti Chess on court three were the closest to securing the win. They were up a set but their opponents, team captain Carey Reno and Mike Marasco, were neck and neck. Carey and Mike had come back after being down, to tie it 5-5. Patti and Noel then won the next two games to win their match, giving TEAM VegasTennis.com it's second win of the day. Since VegasTennis.com won the best of three matches both Friday and Saturday, they advance to sectionals this coming November 8th -10th.

Yet still playing on court one was Lorenzi's K.C. Scherrer and her partner Chris Arambula verses VegasTennis.com's Leonard Fath and Tina Phelps. Playing excellent tennis was K.C. Scherrer , and many fans were cheering on her every success. Her partner was playing an excellent game as well as they beat Leonard and Patti in a very close second set 7-5. The deuce and add duel in the last set's games was constant. It must be said that both sides played excellent, with Leonard Fath making some entertaining shots and many long well played points. While one might say it did not matter because VegasTennis.com had already won the event, that is not true. Everything matters.

In fact, tomorrow, Sunday, is the third day of play, and technically VegasTennis.com has already won, but in order to qualify for sectionals a player has to play two matches. Therefore we play tomorrow. And it does matter. I played today at Baskin Park after the event, and there was no "Sectionals" to shoot for, no event or trophy. But it did matter how I played and I did not quit once. Down 5-2 in the match we came back to tie it 5-5, then lost 7-5, but I gave it 100% the whole time. I am satisfied.

And in the end all participants can be satisfied that they did their part, giving it a 100%.  In particular was the excellent play displayed by Mindy Curnutt and her partner in the second set today against Janet Spelman and Eric Alm. Mindy and Mike can easily walk away satisfied with an excellent match played. When something is that close and the points played as well as they were, how can one possibly be anything but content. What stood out to me is that in the tie breaker Mindy and Mike both went full bore, not holding back one bit, and what else can one ask for?

Like one of the spectators said, "This is excellent competition."

I would say many of the Valley's best 3.0 players were out this weekend and had a chance to compete against one another. And while some see each other at every event, many had never met before. In fact every team on VegasTennis.com had never met each other except for Noel Irwin and Patti Chess. And intuitively they came together perfectly.  Now they get to see how this talent faces up against the other states in the intermountain section this coming November . Until then..........

* Winner in Orange

Sunday Tennis

Playing their heart out today was Carey Reno and Mike Burroughs and although they lost in two sets Carey ran to the net with a big grin, as she should. They played an excellent match with the first set being decided in an extremely close tie breaker, and the danced back in the second set to nearly force a second tie breaker. They were up 0-30 on Jonathan Pruneda's serve, but Jonathan hit two excellent serves tying it at 30-30. Then his serve and volley put the game away. Giving VegasTennis.com it's 3rd win of the day. Today's matches did not count  as far as sectionals is concerned, that was decided yesterday. But it was necessary in order to have players on VegasTennis.com qualify to be able to play in sectionals. So Carey Reno, instead of just defaulting each match, had a full team lined up to play some excellent tennis. 

Waltz through SECTIONALS

The Nevada VegasTennis.com 3.0 team went undefeated in Sectionals taking first place, with Patti Chess, Janet Spelman, Tina Felps, Leonard Fath, Shelleye Warner, Eric Alm and Jonathan Pruneda. 

Tina Felps, who came to the team at a crucial time this year, stepped up her "Tournament" game, as she no longer allowed the buzz in her mind, the hype, get to her. She played the same excellent game that she is known to play weekly in the USA League tennis. Her weekday partner and the team captain Janet Spelman once again assisted in keeping the team a unit, as this is not the first time she captained a team. Not to mention she and her partner Eric Alm dominated local and sectional play, only losing one match the whole time. Eric at first, in the last crucial match against Colorado, was holding back and not playing the excellent tennis that made him 5-0 at sectionals for spring league. Yet he said he at one point stopped thinking about it and just played and Janet described him as being "On fire." As Yoda said... "No thinking..just doing." 

 Patti Chess and Jonathan Pruneda also went undefeated. Patti was consistent and a solid player all the through with Leonard making his usual intuitive shots that leave players stunned. Equally dominating was Leonard Fath and his partner Shelleye Warner. Shelleye , coming off her back injury made key points in the right moments. She had been missing net shots from a talented top spin hitter on the Colorado team, but when it was Colorado's add, it was her volley that got her and Leonard back in the game and allowed them to take the second set and force the tie breaker in one of the two deciding matches of the whole event. Colorado and Nevada was undefeated going in and the #2 and #1 doubles took the early lead , 1 set to zero in both.

 Colorado was handling the heavy wind with poise, but I did not believe the doubt that tried to creep in. Something wanted me to start "Thinking" about if we lost what we would have to do... but I did not go there. The game was not over, and then Nevada stormed back to win all three matches. 

* Winner in Orange