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COLLEGE SQUASH SEASON APPROACHES CRITICAL STAGE; TRINITY FAVORED TO REPEAT
by Rob Dinerman

Dec 23, 2001 © 2001 Rob Dinerman and SquashTalk, photos: © 2001 Ron Beck and Debra Tessier, may not be reproduced without express permission.

With the possible exception of the fast-growing ISDA professional doubles tour, the most dynamic aspect of the entire squash scene in America undoubtedly is the men's college game, which this year features an intimidating three-time defending NISRA team champion, a three-time defending brother combination as individual champions, an imposing Big Three alignment as top contenders for the summit and, barely behind them, a host of solid teams composed of players from all over the country and indeed the world, giving the 2001-2002 Intercollegiate season a greater degree of depth and strength than it has ever previously possessed. In this the eighth year of softball-only competition, so many colleges have upgraded their old facilities, or in many cases constructed impressive new ones replete with high-tech glass-wall courts and impressive spectator galleries, that the entire squash profile among America's foremost colleges and universities has grown to new heights and attracted some of the most outstanding squash talent that has ever been assembled.

Surely the most significant competitive issue surrounding the current season is whether the Trinity Bantams, led by Head Coach Paul Assaiante and freshman sensation Bernardo Samper, can go undefeated for the fourth consecutive season and thereby win their fourth straight NISRA team championship. Such a feat would mean that the program's six seniors, including Lefika Ragonste, Rohan Bhappu and Rohan Juneja in the top eight, would go undefeated throughout their entire intercollegiate careers, a feat last accomplished by several Harvard teams of the mid- and late-1980's, when Coach Dave Fish, himself the captain of Harvard's championship 1971-72 squad, led Kenton Jernigan, David Boyum, Rusty Ball, Joe Dowling and the rest of a star-studded Crimson legion to seven straight perfect campaigns.

This year's collection of Trinity seniors comes into this season with a 52-0 team mark over their first three years, and the entire program seems to have been infused with the goal of sending this sextet, which also includes Gaurav Juneja, Noah Wimmer and Nick Bauquin(a recently converted tennis player and thus the only member of this group who wasn't part of the program as a freshman), off into the twilight with their perfect career-long team record intact. In fact, one of the most noteworthy developments of the early season is the extent to which the non-seniors, including even relative neophytes in the program like the outstanding freshman Samper, have already wholeheartedly bought into this mission.

Part of the reason for the togetherness that permeates the Bantam program even in this decidedly individualistic sport stems from Assaiante's long-held belief in the "rite of passage" approach that requires underclassmen, whatever their talent level, to evince respect to the senior class, and certainly this senior class has become especially deserving of this tribute. As part of this credo, Assaiante makes a promise to every one of his recruits that they will play in at least 50% of the team matches throughout their four-year college career, though of course he presents his best possible line-up against the strongest and most dangerous opponents.

David Yik, Princeton sophomore

This season, it seems he will have to resort to this latter alignment more often than ever before. Harvard, which won the Ivy Scrimmages in mid-November over a Princeton team that was exhausted after completing a draining 5-4 win in the semis over Yale barely an hour before, came within a single match of snapping Trinity's streak last February and has great strength all the way through the roster. Princeton features a killer top five of reigning NISRA Individual champion David Yik (whose older brother Peter, also a Tiger, won that event in both 1999 and 2000), Will Evans, Dan Rutherford, Peter Kelly and Eric Pearson, and every member of this junior-dominated group will be returning next year except for Kelly. Yale possesses probably the best contingent of any of the Ivies in the bottom four positions, and won at least three of the matches in this sector of the line-up in each of their last three encounters with Princeton over the last 10 months, during which these schools alternated victories, all by 5-4 tallies.

Although Harvard suffered the greatest losses of these three perennially powerful programs to graduation (including three of their top six, led by No. 1 Deepak Abraham and No. 3 Shondeep Ghosh, both of India) their present No. 1, Pete Karlen, has continued to improve dramatically, and he joins Samper and another Trinity star, Michael Ferreira, as the leading challengers to Yik for his coveted individual crown. Backing Karlen at the top of the Crimson line-up are Dylan Patterson, Caribbean Champion James Bullock, Jeff Blumberg of Vancouver and Isaac (Ziggy) Whitman, whose father Glen was Harvard captain and a finalist in the Intercollegiates in 1974 before playing a major role on America's Maccabean team that won the silver medal in 1977. As noted, Coach Satinder Bajwa's forces pressed Trinity all the way to a 5-4 outcome last season and they have already demonstrated their strength this fall by posting wins over Princeton in the Ivy Scrimmages and over Yale in the USSRA Five-Man Teams Plate competition.

Gavin Cumberbatch, Yale freshman

Though lacking a true superstar, Yale returns seven of their top eight, has improved during each of the last five years and will be bolstered by the arrival of two freshman, Josh Schwartz and Gavin Cumberbatch, who have already moved into the top four. Schwartz developed his game in Mamaroneck, NY under the expert tutelage of Richard Millman, formerly a premier league coach in England and winner of several USSRA age-group titles before his hips went bad in recent years, while Cumberbatch was ranked No. 1 in Barbados and was the No. 2 player behind Harvard's Bullock in the Caribbean. Head Coach Dave Talbott, himself a fine player on the WPSA professional hardball tour who led the Elis to two NISRA team championships and within a point of a third during the hardball era of the early 1990's, always fields a well-conditioned, hungry and scrappy team, whose success with this approach is buttressed by the warm and lively nature of their home courts, which often frustrate an opponent's attempt to win a point quickly.

Several members of the Yale squad, from Anschul Manchanda and Aftab Mathur, both lithe and fleet Indians, to Chris Olsen, Peter Grote and Ryan Byrnes, all products of the American junior squash system, have games that are at least in some measure predicated on this strategem, which, interestingly, also characterized Talbott's game and brought him to the quarters of the '81 WPSA Championships and to victories over such WPSA stars as Aziz Khan, Bill Andruss and David Boyum during his long and solid WPSA career.

In contrast to the Yale courts, as well as most of Trinity's, which, as noted, are warm and lively, the home courts of the Harvard and Princeton squads have "rougher" side walls, which hold the ball and allow a well-struck short shot to "bite" and die more quickly; this is true as well of Trinity's two brand-new Perspex exhibition courts, which feature a green front wall and blue side walls with the stencilling done on the inside of the blue balls pocking those walls, which tends to slow the ball down. The Big Three Ivy League teams are so closely matched that at least one prominent coach believes that this year the home court advantage, both because of the differing nature of the playing environment and because of the extreme partisanship of the enormous crowds that are expected to turn out for those big matches, may well play a major role in determining which team triumphs.

For the record, Trinity this season is scheduled to play Harvard at home (with the two new courts expected to be officially dedicated on that early-February afternoon), but both Yale and Princeton on the road, which latter fact is especially welcome to the Tiger faithful, who suffered through a dominant, message-conveying 4-1 defeat to the Bantams at Hartford in the final of the USSRA Five-Man Team Championships in early December and are pinning their hopes of reversing this thrashing on the fact that the dual-meet rematch will be staged at Jadwin Gymnasium in New Jersey. It was the second time that Trinity has won this title and in the overwhelming nature of their triumph, especially in yielding a total of four points COMBINED in two of their final-round wins, Trinity's stars seemed to be seeking at least as much to intimidate their college counterparts as to defend their five-man team title.

Not that Trinity's only significant opposition will be presented by Harvard, Princeton and Yale; as noted, there are a greater-than-ever number of schools whose facilities, coaching expertise and recruiting prowess have led to outstanding rosters. Penn's head coach Craig Thorpe-Clark, now in his third season in a coaching tradition that includes Al Malloy and former WPSA superstar Ned Edwards, has finally landed a legitimate big-time No. 1 in freshman Richard Repetto; former WPSA President Dave Johnson's program at Williams will be spearheaded by Wyn Tanjaitrong of Thailand and Parth Doshi of India; little Dennison College in Grandville, Ohio, though a Division Three school, has an outstanding program led by No. 1 Javier Castilla; Wesleyan will be paced by David Cukiemans and, like Hobart College, Bowdoin and Colby, has stepped up and committed the considerable funds needed to build top-rate facilities worthy of much larger institutions. Western Ontario is always a dark horse with their Canadian-grown talent and a reliable skipper in the ageless Jack Fairs, and Dartmouth, mentored by John Power, whose success in guiding the development of his superstar son Jonathon speaks for itself, might be the most improved team of all.

There is no doubt that college squash is "deeper," both in terms of strength, even in the nether regions of a line-up, and in terms of the number of highly competitive teams, than has ever been the case in the history of the NISRA, whether with the hardball or the softball. With the preliminary early-season skirmishes now out of the way, the next two and a half months will generate a frenzy of confrontations, rivalries and turning points and will no doubt produce a fully deserving 2001-2002 champion.

Squashtalk will provide complete coverage of the intercollegiate scene throughout this period, with features, updates and summaries as the action heats up during the forthcoming winter.

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