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ISDA DEC 1 2001 RANKINGS
WAITE AND MUDGE EASILY TOP LIST

By Rob Dinerman, DEC 3 2001

The International Squash Doubles Association(ISDA)recently published its updated rankings for the 2001-2002 season. Unlike most professional squash associations, which base their rankings on a floating 52-week configuration, this set of rankings was determined entirely upon performance during the three events---the Hamilton Cup in Denver,CO in late September, the Tom Page Invitational in Philadelphia,PA in late October and the North American Open in Greenwich,CT in mid-November---that have occurred this autumn.

Gary Waite and Damian Mudge - No surprise at #1 , ISDA photos © 2001)

The operative goal behind this decision was to have seedings and main-draw and qualifying-draw decisions depend on current form, rather than have an event that took place last March have as much influence as one that happened during the present campaign; this seemed especially important in view of the manner in which the schedule really picks up in January 2002(when ranking events are scheduled for all four weekends)and in the succeeding months extending well into the spring.

Gary Waite - Doubles Standout (ISDA Photo by B Collier)

This adjustment also allowed the several "surprise" teams that had upset-filled break-out performances so far this season to have those results reflected in the rankings in more significant fashion than would otherwise have been the case. Most noteworthy among the beneficiaries were Clive Leach and Blair Horler, ranked No. 21 and 17 respectively in the final 2000-2001 standings, whose four-match advance through the qualifier and to the final at the Philadelphia Racquet Club catapulted them to the co-No. 5 position, behind only co-No. 1's Gary Waite and Damien Mudge(champions in all three tournaments and winners now 16 times in only 17 career attempts)and co-No. 3's Willie Hosey and Viktor Berg, the losing finalists in Denver and Greenwich. Leach and Horler actually defeated the latter duo in the semis in Philly, but Hosey/Berg avenged this setback in five gruelling quarter-final games on the hot-court environment of the Greenwich Country Club with a decisive 7-1 match-concluding run from 8-10 in the last game.

Clive Leach and Blair Horler - #3 team (ISDA photod © 2001)

The other major conversation-piece this fall was co-authored by the new alliance formed by ISDA veteran David Kay, who with last season's partner Josh MacDonald placed just out of the top ten, and longtime PSA softball performer Chris Walker, who had his own career highlight in this discipline last spring, when at age 34 he advanced through the qualifying draw and all the way to a 2-0 final-round lead in the prestigious British Open before faltering under the relentless comeback pressure of eventual champion David Palmer.

Willie Hosey and Viktor Berg - #2 team ISDA photos © 2001)

Walker had entered two ISDA events last spring, pretty much as a lark, losing in the qualifier both times and placing 55th out of only 56 ISDA rankees. Notwithstanding the paucity of Walker's doubles experience and the risk implicit in Kay's forsaking a partnership that had brought him to a half-dozen ISDA semis last season, this pair burst out of the blocks at the Denver Club, storming through their qualifier bracket, winning 3-1 over Aussies Brett Martin and Scott Butcher and then upsetting another new pairing, Jamie Bentley and Michael Pirnak, 18-17 in the fifth, when Pirnak hit a rail back at himself, resulting in a match-deciding let-point call. When the same simultaneous-match-point scenario that had so rewarded them in this case returned to undo Walker/Kay one event later in Philadelphia---at which crossroads juncture Horler crushed a backhand crosscourt winner at Kay in the last round of an implicitly brutal qualifying bracket---it both showed the degree to which caprice often plays a role in competition at this elite level and springboarded Horler and Leach to a 15-12 in the fifth quarter-final win over Bentley/Pirnak(who therefore suffered their two successive first-round losses by a combined total of just four points!)and the subsequent straight-game(two overtimes)semi over Hosey and Berg.

The latter pairing, composed exclusively of top-five ISDA rankees last season, rebounded at the North American Open, where they followed their aforementioned revenge for the Horler/Leach defeat with their second successful semi over Todd Binns and Jeff Mulligan, who reached this stage both here and in Denver with a pair in each site of main-draw wins, the first of which entailed saving a trio of match-points from 12-14 in the fifth, with Mulligan's forehand crosscourt winner at 14-all especially delighting his boisterous home-club supporters in Colorado.

Chris Walker and Dave Kay, ISDA photo( r) ST photo (l) © 2001)

After subduing Binns and Mulligan(co-ranked No. 9)in Greenwich, Hosey and Berg forced Waite and Mudge for the only time this season to a fifth game in the ensuing final, whereupon this dominant duo, facing the very real possibility of their first loss in nearly a year, responded like the champions they are by racing out to a 5-0 lead and seizing this coveted crown for the second consecutive time, actually the fifth straight for Waite, who had won in 1997-99 with Mark Talbott, whom Waite also conquered in the final of the North American Open SINGLES event in 1993, when he thereby clinched the first of his two WPSA No. 1 rankings.

Although the star-laden but heretofore star-crossed Pirnak/Bentley(Nos. 10 and co-2 last season) contingent has suffered in the rankings both from not being able to carry over last winter and spring's points and from their two agonizingly close early-season defeats, they played extremely well in Connecticut, where they really challenged Waite and Mudge in a three-overtime four-game semi, and breezed to victory in the non-ranking Ben Saunders tourney in early October in Toronto; they have far too much firepower to remain out of the top ten for long. Anders Wahlstedt(No. 6 last season) and Scott Stoneburgh, who issued Waite/Mudge their only career defeat in the first round at the U.S. Pro in Wilmington, DE last January and then proceeded to win the entire tournament, have only played in one event so far this campaign, reaching the semis in Philadelphia before bowing in three to the revenge-seeking top seeds in their first confrontation since that stunning nine-month-old upset.

They will have to really come on in the months ahead to regain their previous standing, as will the Canadian combination of Scott Dulmage and Dean Brown, who have yet to win a match this season, though Brown did combine with PSA superstar Jonathon Power to reach the final of the non-ranking but highly-regarded Cambridge Club Doubles, played during Thanksgiving weekend and won by Waite and England's Mark Chaloner. There are now as many as a half-dozen teams ready to contend for the status of top challenger to the nearly invincible Waite and Mudge, and the emergence of several new and fully deserving faces in the tour's top echelon are duly reflected in the ranking list below.

ISDA TOP 20 Rankings         [complete list]
(rankings are computed for individual players, based on results for team pairings in each ISDA events. Rankings current as of 11-25-01

Other notable players:

21. Scott Stoneburgh
24. Preston Quick
33. Neil Vohr
34. Damian Walker

* * * * * * * *

To reach Rob Dinerman write to robd@squashtalk.com

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