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[College Results]

Princeton Edges Yale Men in New Haven
By Rob Dinerman © 2003 SquashTalk Feb 3, 2003 © 2003 [short version]
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Yasser El Halaby, Princeton Tigers#1 wouldn't throw in the towel against Julian Illingworth and a vocal supporting crowd. (photo © 2003 Debra Tessier)

YALE ON THE CUSP
It had been a long time coming, but it now appeared certain that victory over arch-rival and recent-years' nemesis Princeton, and the first-ever softball Ivy League crown it would likely represent, was finally at hand for the Bulldogs of Yale. Other than a 5-4 win in New Haven four years ago, the Elis hadn't defeated Princeton since 1994, the last season of hardball squash, and hadn't recorded another home win over their big three rival since 1989, a full 14 years ago. For the past several years, the losses had been by agonizing 5-4 margins, in each case with the superior Yale depth accounting for sweeps of the Nos. 6-9 positions, which had in each case been nullified by Princeton sweeps of the top five spots.

That perennial Princeton domination of the top half of the line-up had been keyed by the exploits of its four-man class of 2003, deemed the best in school history by 22-year head coach and former mid-1970's all-American Bob Callahan, and consisting of 2002 Intercollegiates finalist Will Evans, 2001 Champion David Yik, Canadian star Danny Rutherford and multiple US Junior crown holder Eric Pearson. (boasting five national titleholders in this lineup) If this talented quartet of seniors could add the 2003 Ivy League title to those it had already won in 2000 and 2002, they would set a school record by winning three such championships during their intercollegiate careers.

Will Evans had too much firepower at #2 for Yale's Anschul Manchanda. (photo © 2003 Debra Tessier)

This afternoon they had all won their respective matches in the Nos. 2-5 slots, but Yale had responded with victories at 6-8 (albeit with two of those matches going to five games), Yale's A. J. McCrery was almost certain to (and did) win at No. 9, and Yale freshman sensation Julian Illingworth, spurred on by a raucous crowd of 500 vociferous supporters (many of whom were chanting "Jul-I-An, Jul-I-An" as he built his seemingly insurmountable lead), was playing magnificently in dominating the first two games of the No. 1 match against Princeton's Egyptian-born freshman Yasser el-Halaby and racing to a commanding 7-1 advantage in the third game.

Illingworth had lost in five to el-Halaby from two-love up on the same court three months earlier in the pre-season Ivy League Scrimmage, but throughout his unbelievably high-quality performance to 7-1 in the third he had completely dispelled any fears the Yale faithful may have harbored about a repeat fade-out: on the contrary, he was playing at a higher level than anyone could recall, perhaps the harvest of the whirlwind of world-level transatlantic junior and senior events that have filled his schedule for the past few months.

The most recent of these came in Greenwich just one week prior, when Illingworth had reached the final of an American team selection event before narrowly losing (9-7 in the fourth) to 2002 S. L. Green finalist Preston Quick.

ROARING CROWD

Princeton Tigers came to New Haven ready to play. (photo © 2003 Debra Tessier)

Now, with a packed house roaring its approval of his every point-winning move, he was badly out-playing his storied opponent, keeping his rails right on the walls, lobbing to wondrous effect to the deepest corners of Yale's four-glass-wall exhibition court, which have a tendency to "hold" the ball, making it harder for a beleaguered el-Halaby to excavate and thus leaving Illingworth in an even better position to cash in. When he is on his game, as he certainly was on this occasion, Illingworth seems to flow to the ball in a style similar to that of Yale women's head coach Mark Talbott, Illingworth's occasional practice partner and undoubtedly the greatest squash player in U. S. history, though not even Talbott at a similar stage in his career had
anywhere near the firepower that Illingworth already possesses.

What Talbott DID have right from the start and throughout his nonpareil career, however, is a knack for closing out a match that Illingworth still needs to acquire, his already impressive accomplishments notwithstanding.

And when el-Halaby, who had appeared completely flustered and without any answers in dropping a 9-1 second game, decided late in the third to abandon the front-game attempts that were getting him into so much trouble and instead resorted to power and depth, the match inexorably started to turn in his direction. He climbed to 4-7, and even when Illingworth got the serve back, hit a winner and thus got himself to 8-4, match-ball, plenty of squash aficionados in the suddenly jittery gallery sensed that he had to make good on this opportunity to finish it off, since there might not be another.

THE CRUCIAL POINT

Illingworth Kept the Initiative for almost three games. (photo © 2003 Debra Tessier)

Even as he waited for Illingworth's serve, el-Halaby's body language appeared bold and confident and Illingworth looked like someone hoping for a nick or a tin, something to get him that last point. And when it was he who (barely) tinned a backhand drop shot at the end of a lengthy exchange, his shoulders slumped and his expression betrayed his disappointment and (prescient) concern about what lay in store, namely an el-Halaby six-point sweep to 10-8 and a fourth-game shut-out involving only three hand-outs, the first of which did not occur until the score stood at 6-0.

Almost as important as the stat line of that fourth game was the way its course both
took the crowd out of the game and allowed el-Halaby to really groove what had early on been somewhat wayward stroke production.

Yasser fought for every point and emerged the victor. (photo © 2003 Debra Tessier)

Finding a way to derail, or at least delay, the locomotive that the el-Halaby attack had become by that stage would have been a Homeric achievement, but to Illingworth's everlasting credit, he battled back at the outset of the fifth game, which seesawed through well over a half-dozen hands-out before a single official point was recorded. The game score actually stood at three points apiece 10 minutes later, but throughout this portion of the action Illingworth was being cruelly maneuvered, forced to respond defensively to the hammering el-Halaby was applying and leaving the stylish Egyptian with open balls and plenty of time to make use of the deception that is a major part of his arsenal.

SAVED SOPHOMORES
He got to 5-3, then added some quick points on desperation low-percentage
Illingworth attempts that found the tin. The young Yalie would not score again and el-Halaby dashed triumphantly across the finish line and into the exuberant embrace of his coach and grateful teammates, especially the pair, sophomores Dent Wilkens and Nathan Beck, who had incurred those five-game losses, in Beck's case from 6-6 in the fifth after he had erased a 6-1 deficit against Gavin Cumberbatch.

Gavin Cumberbatch out-duelled Beck in a constantly close five games at the #8 position. (photo © 2003 Debra Tessier)

Those sophomores and the rest of Princeton's non-seniors will have to carry on next year without the history-seeking class of 2003, who are now favored to clinch the Ivy League title with a win next week over a Harvard squad that lost 8-1 to Trinity this
past weekend. But a Yale win over Princeton next year won't mean the same as
a win in this meet would have: every NBA team beat the Chicago Bulls the year
after they lost Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen, Dennis Rodman, Phil Jackson
and the rest of the members of the team that constructed the three-peat of
NBA championships from 1996-98 and none of it meant much. The key was to
defeat THIS group of Princeton players, and in fairness Yale DOES potentially
still have one more chance to do so should the schools meet in the nine-man
postseason Potter Trophy event scheduled at Jadwin Gymnasium in Princeton in
three weeks.

YALE WOMEN, TRINITY TEAMS ALSO WINNERS
The rest of the weekend's action was somewhat anti-climatic. The Yale
women earned a 9-0 shut-out win over their Princeton counterparts in an arena
that by that time had been largely drained of spectators and excitement in
the wake of the disappointing outcome of the men's match, which in an unusual
and imprudent bit of planning had preceded the women's meet, reversing the
normal procedure.

And up in Cambridge, defending men's and women's intercollegiate team champion Trinity posted identical 8-1 wins over Harvard, though neither score reveals how competitive many of the matches actually were. Yvan Badan trailed Harvard co-captain Dylan Patterson two games to one at No. 5, Hilary Thorndike dropped a controversial five-game match at No. 6 after winning the first two games, and only three of the Trinity's women's eight wins didn't require at least a fourth game.

Michael Blumberg gave the Crimson their lone win in the men's match with his four-game victory over Nick Kyme, while senior Ella Witcher defeated Bronwyn Cooper 3-0 at No. 8 for the Harvard women, whose match against Yale in two weeks will almost certainly determine the 2003 Ivy League championship. The clash at No. 1 between reigning Intercollegiate Individual champion Amina Helal and Harvard co-captain Louisa Hall was greatly anticipated in the wake of Hall's recent tournament win at the Harvard Club of New York (where she defeated both Latasha and Shabana Khan) two weeks ago, but Hall was hampered by the aftereffects of an intestinal flu that invaded
her system earlier in the week and Helal, just one week removed from winning
the Betty Constable Invitational, was at the top of her formidable game. Her
9-0 9-3 2-9 9-0 victory conveyed an emphatic message of how hard it will be
for anyone so inclined to deny either her or her Trinity teammates a repeat
of the individual and team championships they won for the first time last
season.

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